The Wyoming Supreme Court has upheld the firing of a Wyoming Game and Fish investigator whose behavior reportedly disrupted her workplace.

Kathy Crofts was fired in May 2012 for “flagrant insubordination, dishonesty, misconduct, unsatisfactory work performance” and other problems, including concern that she wouldn’t be able to testify in court because of her disciplinary record.

A Game and Fish investigation concluded Crofts had muddled a joint investigation with a federal agent — then was dishonest about what she’d done, performed poor work during one of the state’s largest wildlife investigations and clashed with her supervisor, including an incident where she mockingly bowed to him.

There were also a couple complaints from the public, including what Crofts’ supervisor called a “troubling” decision to investigate and seize a Cody woman’s illegal parakeet in 2008.

Crofts had said the allegations were generally not true, that she was treated unfairly and that the department had failed to properly follow its disciplinary procedures. However, in the final word on the matter, the Wyoming Supreme Court denied Crofts' appeal and effectively affirmed her firing on Jan. 7. The high court ruled that Crofts had raised her arguments — that she'd been deprived of due process and that the Game and Fish employee who initially disciplined her lacked the authority to do so — too late in the process.

Crofts served with the department for 21 years. She worked as a game warden before taking a post in Cody as a wildlife investigator in 2007.

While Crofts had received some previous discipline, court records say the significant trouble started during “Operation 10 Sleep” — an investigation into a Ten Sleep area family who was illegally selling its landowner elk licenses to wealthy hunters around the country.

Crofts started out as the case’s lead investigator in early 2010. However, the operation grew in scope — it would ultimately result in convictions against nearly 20 defendants in state and federal court — and the case work was shared with investigators across multiple agencies. The Game and Fish has described it as “Wyoming’s Biggest Wildlife Case.”

Crofts initially drew praise for her teamwork, Game and Fish records say, but U.S. Fish and Wildlife Special Agent Ron Armstrong would later complain that because of Crofts’ faults and behavior, “the success of the investigation was frequently in jeopardy.”

The record suggests Armstrong’s complaint was the final straw in a series of events that began in July 2011; that’s when Crofts clashed with her immediate supervisor over a press release about the Ten Sleep investigation.

Crofts sent an email to several people involved with the case, questioning parts of the draft. She said she was trying to fix inaccurate information, but supervisor Mike Ehlebracht saw it as a complaint that she wasn’t getting enough credit.

In September 2011 — shortly after Crofts was honored by the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission for her 20 years of service — Ehlebracht brought up the email in a mid-year evaluation.

The conversation became heated and, according to Ehlebracht, it culminated with Crofts slamming his office door.

When Ehlebracht ordered her to come back, he said Crofts dropped to her knees and waved her hands toward him, saying, “You’re in charge; you’re the boss.”

Crofts apologized to Ehlebracht the next day for “improper” behavior. However, a few days after that, Crofts claimed Ehlebracht had threatened to hit her and that her “bow” was actually an attempt to take evasive action.

Neither Game and Fish supervisors nor Deborah Baumer, a hearing officer who later heard an appeal of the firing, found Crofts’ claim to be credible. She was issued a one-day suspension.

Conflict followed joint investigation

A few months later, U.S. Forest Service Special Agent Scott Bragonier complained about Crofts’ actions in another case.

Bragonier and Crofts had jointly investigated a man who’d committed various hunting and outfitting violations on the Shoshone National Forest.

Bragonier thought they had an agreement: Crofts would pursue a couple hunting license violations in state court and he’d pursue the other offenses in federal court to ban the man from national forest land.

However, in February 2012, Bragonier learned from a Game and Fish news release that several of the charges had been filed and dismissed in state court as part of a plea deal. As a result, federal prosecutors couldn’t file some of the charges Bragonier had wanted.

Bragonier said when he questioned Crofts about what had happened, she claimed the Park County Attorney had picked the charges and chalked it up to the luck of the draw.

But that isn’t what happened.

Park County Prosecuting Attorney Bryan Skoric said Crofts actually wrote the citations into state court herself and specifically told him which charges could be dropped in a deal. Skoric said he hadn’t known Bragonier was planning additional charges in federal court.

“Skoric further admitted ... that Crofts had placed him in a potentially unethical position by omitting aspects of the case and that Crofts had damaged her working relationship with him,” Baumer wrote.

In early March 2012, Bragonier said he was done working with Crofts. For her part, Crofts said Bragonier had misconstrued their agreement.

A history of appeals

When one of the “Operation 10 Sleep” defendants was tried a couple weeks later, Crofts was not called to the witness stand because of her past and pending discipline.

A couple weeks after the trial, special agent Armstrong filed his complaint alleging that Crofts had jeopardized the Ten Sleep case. He said Crofts “consistently documented information which was incorrect and inaccurate in her investigative reports” and “given the choice I would not work with her on any future endeavor.”

In firing her the next month, Deputy Game and Fish Director Ian Kennedy wrote that Crofts had strained relationships and created mistrust with her managers, other law enforcement agencies and the public.

Court records and news accounts say she upset a Cody daycare owner and some parents when she seized a Monk parakeet from the daycare in November 2008.

When Crofts learned the daycare had one of the illegal birds — and when the owner resisted turning it over — she got a search warrant and brought along a uniformed Cody police officer to help seize the parakeet.

“For my purposes, the bird does not belong in the state of Wyoming. We don’t want it here. It’s against the law,” Crofts explained to the Billings Gazette at the time, saying she wanted to protect native birds.

However, supervisor Ehlebracht wrote in Crofts’ 2009 evaluation that her actions “raised serious questions about her analysis and decision making.”

“This is not the type of case that should be accepted or worked by the (Wildlife Investigative Unit),” Ehlebracht wrote.

Crofts claimed her firing was retaliation for fighting her initial one-day suspension in October, for complaining about a hostile work environment and for filing a charge of discrimination and sexual harassment against the department with the Wyoming Department of Workforce Services Division of Labor Standards and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Baumer, the hearing officer, found no evidence of that. After listening to six days of testimony and arguments, she upheld Crofts’ firing in a January 2014 decision.

Crofts appealed and Fifth Judicial District Court Judge Steven Cranfill affirmed Baumer’s decision in a ruling last March. Crofts appealed again and the Wyoming Supreme Court ruled against her this month.

Editor's note: This version corrects and expands the summary of what the Wyoming Supreme Court ruled.