Natrona County Resident Charged with Aggravated Homicide and DUI

A Natrona County man appeared in circuit court on Nov. 6 for an initial appearance. A warrant for his arrest was issued on Nov. 3.

Steven Gale Spearman, 26, is charged with three counts of aggravated homicide and a driving while under the influence resulting in serious bodily injury. All four charges are felonies, the first three carrying a penalty up to 20 years in prison each.

Spearman will have a preliminary hearing in 10 to 20 days to establish probable cause to bind the case over to a higher court. It is not uncommon for defendants to waive the preliminary trial and go straight to an arraignment, in which case he would make a plea.

The crash happened in the early hours of May 7, 2022. At 4:22 AM the Casper Public Safety Communication Center received a 911 call from a woman who told dispatch that she had been in a crash with a "wrong way driver." Deputies arrived soonafter.

According to a Wyoming Highway Patrol crash summary, all four people in the vehicle were not wearing seatbelts and had been ejected. Despite life-saving efforts by law enforcement, Dalton Foos, Justin Robles, and Abigail Helms were pronounced dead at the scene of the crash.

A semi-truck driver was at the scene when law enforcement arrived. He told a deputy that he was traveling northbound on Interstate 25 when he saw the crashed Toyota that Spearman was driving. He said he stopped and tried to help Kohtala until law enforcement showed up.

Spearman was located near a fence. He told the deputy that he was driving and wrecked his vehicle because he "blew a tire or a tie rod or something in the front end" and then was struck by the vehicle driven by Foos. He said he was already out of the car when his vehicle was hit. Investigators later determined that he had been driving a borrowed vehicle.

According to an affidavit supporting the charges, deputies suspected Spearman was under the influence. "I could smell alcohol," they stated. Spearman told authorities he had one beer two or three hours ago. Later, at Banner Health, Spearman complied to a voluntary blood draw which yielded a BAC of .173%. Anything over a .08% is above the legal limit.

The Wyoming Highway Patrol determined that Spearman was driving alone on north on I-25 when he lost control of the vehicle and crashed into the center median cable barrier, spun around and came to rest facing south in a northbound lane. Afterwards, the Yukon came up the hill towards Spearman's vehicle and tried to swerve, but "side swiped" it and rolled.

The woman who called dispatch suffered significant injuries. Court records reflect that she had a foreign body inside her hand, she recalled having a piece of glass in her head that she asked an EMT to remove. She tore two ligaments and the Miniscus in her right knee; and she had to see a speech therapist after the crash to help her relearn to form sentences correctly.