Allegedly drunk tourist crashes into Cody business

Posted 6/6/24

An Iowa man paid the wrong kind of visit to one of Cody’s top tourist attractions over the weekend, crashing through the front wall of the Cody Firearms Experience with his SUV late Saturday …

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Allegedly drunk tourist crashes into Cody business

Posted

An Iowa man paid the wrong kind of visit to one of Cody’s top tourist attractions over the weekend, crashing through the front wall of the Cody Firearms Experience with his SUV late Saturday night.

Authorities allege Juan C. Cancino-Cisneros was “extremely intoxicated” and have charged the 30-year-old Sioux City, Iowa resident with multiple criminal counts.

At a Monday court hearing, a prosecutor accused Cancino-Cisneros of “almost running into a carload of people” and “almost blowing up” the Cody Firearms Experience, as he severed the building’s gas line in the crash.

“He’s not only an extreme flight risk, but he’s also a serious public safety hazard based on his history of DUI and the amount of death and destruction he could have caused in this case,” argued Deputy Park County Prosecuting Attorney Jack Hatfield.

Park County Circuit Court Judge Joey Darrah adopted the prosecutor’s recommendation and set bail at $25,000 cash. Cancino-Cisneros remained in jail on Wednesday.

The damage to the Cody Firearms Experience’s building on West Yellowstone Avenue was substantial. But the business — which is best known for offering customers the opportunity to shoot a variety of Western guns within an indoor range — was able to reopen the day after the incident.

Charging documents indicate Saturday’s 10:40 p.m. crash could have been much worse.

Cody police say Cancino-Cisneros was traveling west on West Yellowstone Avenue at “a high rate of speed” when he left his lane and bounced off the curb near the Fireworks Factory Outlet. His Dodge Nitro then veered across the street — nearly hitting a family in the oncoming, eastbound lane of traffic — before going up over the opposite curb, across the parking lot and through the wall of the Cody Firearms Experience. The SUV wound up almost entirely inside the building.

The vehicle severed both an electrical line and a natural gas line, and responding Cody police officers heard a “loud hissing” from the venting gas. They evacuated the area until service was shut off.

Officer Brandon Tilman said he found Cancino-Cisneros in the Nitro. According to the officer’s sworn account, the driver smelled strongly like alcohol, slurred his speech, was unsteady on his feet and was uncooperative with both police and responding medical personnel.

Cancino-Cisneros reportedly refused to follow several of Tilman’s commands and “informed me he did not have to respond to me at all,” the officer wrote.

To check the suspect’s blood alcohol levels, police obtained a search warrant from Darrah shortly after midnight and blood samples were drawn at Cody Regional Health. He’s been charged with a felony count of property destruction totaling $1,000 or more and misdemeanor counts of reckless endangering and driving under the influence of alcohol for a second time in 10 years; prosecutors said he was convicted of impaired driving about a year-and-a-half ago in Iowa.

Cancino-Cisneros told the court that he’d been vacationing in the area with his fiance and child, and “I don’t know how to get them back home.”

Hatfield offered to help get the Nitro released to Cancino-Cisneros’s fiance, though both the prosecutor and the judge said they were unsure whether the crashed vehicle is in drivable condition. However, if Cancino-Cisneros makes bail, he will remain barred from any driving and will need the court’s written permission to leave Wyoming while the case remains pending. He has been appointed a public defender.

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