A 29-year-old Fremont County man who accidentally stole a 3-month-old baby while taking a running vehicle from a Riverton apartment complex in February was sentenced to eight to ten years in prison on Thursday for kidnapping.
Patrick Dushane Brown also has an uncertain chance of receiving a shorter sentence, according to officials at his sentencing hearing in Fremont County District Court on Thursday.
District Court Judge Jason Conder, who accepted Brown’s plea agreement with Fremont County Chief Deputy Attorney Tim Hancock, recommended Wyoming’s Youthful Offender Program for him.
If Brown completes the program successfully, he may return to request a sentence reduction.
However, Hancock stated that he is unsure whether he will request a sentence reduction, and Conder reiterated that he is unsure whether he will grant it.
“I’m looking for real change, something that shows you have turned a new leaf,” Conder told him. “If you just stay the same old you with the same bad thinking, you’re not going to get a sentence reduction.”
Brown has credit for the 172 days he has already served in jail.
Though the baby’s mother was not in court on Thursday, Brown apologized to her and the family from whom he took the baby on February 9th.
“I apologize that the family had to go through this pain that I put them through,” said Brown, who pleaded guilty to one count of kidnapping in June. “Please forgive me. I hope they accept my apologies.
According to Hancock, the mother’s absence from court was most likely due to verbal attacks on her from people who read about the kidnapping on social media.
Conder later stated that it was unfortunate that people ridiculed others “from the cheap seats.”
Public defender Valerie Schoneberger emphasized, and Conder agreed, that Brown had no intention of stealing the baby. She described Brown’s vehicle theft as a stupid, drunken mistake he committed while “essentially homeless.”
According to Schoneberger, the right thing to do would have been to return the baby rather than leave it in the cold on a night with 19-degree weather, but Brown was drunk and panicked, believing he was leaving the baby near a “nice house” on Riverview Road after discovering her presence, turning off the vehicle, and fleeing on foot.
Kidnapping is punishable by up to twenty years in prison.
That Night
Brown took the Ford Escape around 7:58 p.m. on Feb. 9, one minute after her mother exited the car at the College View apartment complex on Riverton’s west end.
He drove down Hill Street and turned right onto Riverview Road, as if to cross the Wind River Indian Reservation, Hancock said Thursday.
According to Hancock, at some point during the investigation, Brown heard something in the back and turned to see the baby. Then he fled, leaving the baby and the car behind, eventually getting a ride from someone.
The Riverton Police Department received the call around 8:09 p.m., according to Conder.
A U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs agent happened to be in the area, was aware of the ongoing search for the baby, and discovered it in the car at 8:36 p.m., Hancock said.
The baby was separated from her mother for about a half hour, and Brown’s ride in the stolen car lasted about six minutes over four miles, according to time data presented in court.
On Scene
Cowboy State Daily covered the scene as emergency medical and law enforcement personnel converged on the abandoned vehicle and baby.
A woman with dark hair approached Blue Spruce Lane and Riverview Road, running and shouting, “My baby! “My baby!”
She took a crying baby wrapped in a blanket into her arms and walked toward an ambulance that had arrived on the scene at the same time.
An emergency medical responder carried the baby’s car seat carrier to the ambulance, a few paces behind the distraught mother.
Investigators apprehended Brown weeks later after a confidential source told RPD Detective Sgt. Eric Smits about hearing Brown discuss stealing a vehicle and then hearing a baby breathing inside it.
