As long as he stays out of Wyoming, an Arkansas man likely won’t have to answer to a pending felony drug charge in Park County. The 41-year-old absconded while his case was pending, and prosecutors have decided it’s not worth the expense of hauling him back here.

William J. Griffin was originally arrested in April 2023, when Cody police allegedly found about 6 grams of meth and a small amount of THC in his vehicle. The Park County Attorney’s Office changed him with one felony and one misdemeanor count of drug possession.

After 38 days in the detention center, Griffin made bail, and records indicate his court-appointed attorney later struck a plea deal with prosecutors. However, Griffin — who’d returned to his home in Hot Springs, Arkansas — failed to show up for a change of plea hearing in April 2024. District Court Judge Bill Simpson issued a warrant for Griffin’s arrest. 

He remained at large until early February, when authorities in Hot Springs took him into custody.

Park County authorities initially indicated they wanted to bring Griffin back to Cody, but Deputy County Attorney Larry Eichele said his office reversed course after learning the transportation could cost more than $5,000. Eichele indicated that they changed the warrant to be limited to Wyoming only, and Griffin was soon freed from the Garland County, Arkansas, jail.

Doing the right thing

Shortly after his release, he got back in touch with his court-appointed attorney, asking how he could take care of his still-pending case in Park County. Griffin explained that he’d wound up homeless while on bond and returned to Arkansas to get help from his family.

“I know I didn’t go about it all the right way and I sincerely apologize for that but I do want to do the right thing,” he wrote in a February email included in court records.

However, Griffin later changed tack, representing himself and submitting a motion in August to “quash” his prosecution. He argued police illegally searched his vehicle and the drugs actually belonged to a passenger in his vehicle.

To bolster his case, Griffin included screenshots from responses he’d received from Google’s AI assistant. (The assistant apparently indicated that Griffin’s version of events raised “significant legal concerns” while recommending he consult an attorney.)

Griffin later submitted another filing in which he alleged he’d been sexually harassed by his “ineffective” attorney and complained that he’d lost his vehicle and possessions to his ex-girlfriend after his arrest. (The woman Griffin identified as his ex is currently serving a 20-year prison sentence in Montana; KTVQ reported that the woman hit and killed a different boyfriend with her vehicle in Billings in August 2023.)

Staying out of Wyoming ‘forever’

To resolve his case in Park County, Griffin suggested the judge sign a “one-hitter quitter form” he had prepared, which said Wyoming won’t extradite him from Arkansas. Eichele countered that the defendant should be required to reappear before the district court before his motions are addressed.

At a hearing last week, Judge Simpson agreed that the case should effectively remain suspended until Griffin is served with the revised warrant — and the judge indicated that probably won’t happen unless Griffin returns to the state on his own.

Though a warrant remains active, “the State of Wyoming, I don’t believe, feels it necessary to retrieve you from Arkansas and bring you back to Wyoming,” Simpson said.

Griffin, who appeared by phone, said little at the brief Oct. 10 hearing. In his earlier motions, however, he swore he would “never enter the great State of Wyoming ever again, nor make the same mistakes as to passengers and contraband, and to stay away from the types of influences that the defendant was around (the passenger).”

Griffin said the events from April 2023 were “once in a lifetime” — and that he’d learned a valuable lesson he would never forget.

Simpson noted that the Wyoming warrant remains active.