Otto man bound over to district court on 3 felonies

A 45-year-old Otto man is facing three felony charges for allegedly intervening in a dispute between his son and three Powell boys in December.

Clifford Preston Winters was scheduled to appear in circuit court Monday for his preliminary hearing, where a judge would have decided if there was sufficient evidence for the criminal case to move forward.  A few hours before it was to begin, Winters waived his right to the hearing, sending the case to the Fifth Judicial District Court of Big Horn County.

Winters was originally charged with four felony counts: two alleging aggravated assault and battery, one alleging conspiracy to commit aggravated assault and battery, and one alleging property destruction. However, Big Horn County Attorney Marcia Bean has since dismissed the conspiracy charge.  

The most serious of the three that remain, the two aggravated assault and battery charges, each carry a maximum sentence of up to 10 years in jail and/or a fine of up to $10,000.

Winters is the supervisor of Big Horn County Weed & Pest.  The chairman of the Weed & Pest board, Tim Beck of Lovell, said this week that the board is aware of the charges but letting the case play out in the courts.

Background

The incident that prompted the charges occurred during the early morning hours of Dec. 17. Seth Hoblit, a Big Horn County Sheriff’s deputy, wrote in an affidavit that he was summoned at 1:36 a.m. to a vehicle accident with multiple parties and injuries at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Burlington.

Upon arrival, he found a green Ford truck and a white Pontiac Grand Am with extensive damage to its passenger side.  Three boys, Kyler Reeves, Hudson Heaton and Christian Myers, exited the Pontiac.  Winters and his son, Clifford T. Winters, exited the Ford.

Hoblit wrote that the dispute appeared to stem from a disagreement and name-calling on social media between Clifford T. Winters, 18, and Reeves, Heaton and Myers, who were all between 17 and 18 at the time.

Reeves, Heaton and Myers told investigators they arrived at the Winters house believing they would fight on the county road, but left when they heard gun shots.

They said Clifford T. Winters then reached out to them, asking where they’d gone and suggesting they meet at the LDS church.  “The next thing they knew, a truck was coming right at them in the parking lot, slamming into the car they were sitting in,” Hoblit wrote.

In their account, Reeves and Heaton said they exited their vehicle and approached the truck, believing it to be Clifford T. Winters, but were instead met by Clifford P. Winters who “stepped out, cocked a gun and pointed it right at them.”

Hoblit said in the affidavit that all three of the boys were transported by ambulance to Powell Valley Healthcare. In the case of Myers, it was due to a heart condition.

Another sheriff’s deputy on scene later took a Glock 43 pistol from Clifford P. Winters, who admitted he’d fired it outside his residence and was holding it in his hand when approached by the boys after the collision.

Clifford P. Winters told investigators he was awakened earlier that night by a motion alarm and was told by his son that there were three guys outside who wanted to beat him up. He admitted to firing three shots into the ground.

The younger Winters told investigators that the three Powell boys started the name-calling and initially invited him to fight in Powell, but because he didn’t have a license, he told them if they wanted to fight, they should show up at his house.

When asked if he’d pulled into the church and rammed his vehicle into the Grand Am, the elder Winters nodded his head and said “yep,” according to the affidavit.  He immediately added, “I screwed up.”

Investigators would later review the messages on the phone of Clifford T. Winters. They found one in which Heaton told Winters that they’d do it another time and were headed back to Powell. It was followed by one from Winters urging them to return and meet at the LDS church, where he would be coming by himself and driving his dad’s truck.

The county attorney’s office initially charged the younger Winters  with conspiracy to commit aggravated assault and battery, but a circuit court judge dismissed the case in early January, finding there was not enough evidence to support the charge.

Innocent until
proven guilty

When asked about the case on Monday, Big Horn County Commissioner Bruce Jolley referred questions to the Weed & Pest board, saying Winters is neither on the county payroll nor under the commissions chain of command.

Jolley said the commission simply appoints members of the Weed & Pest board. At the present time, it consists of seven members: Kie Miller and Ken Blackburn of Cowley, Linda Hamilton and Todd Jones of Hyattville, JanaLee Call of Otto, Dale Nuttall of Greybull and Tim Beck of Lovell.

Beck, who serves as the chairman, called the case against Winters “a personal issue” that “has nothing to do” with his role as the Weed & Pest supervisor.

“If the court system finds that the charges have merit and that the repercussions will affect Cliff’s ability to perform his job, at that point the board will act upon the facts as they present themselves to us,” Beck said in an email. “We all believe that a person is innocent until proven guilty and we will not act upon anything until or if and when we have a court decision. 

“Until then, as long as the situation doesn’t affect his job performance, which we are currently satisfied with, nothing more will be said.”