Blake Stinson

Following months of investigation and review, the Cody Police Department has reinstated an officer who was accused of being overly aggressive with a teen last winter.

Longtime Cody Officer Blake Stinson was placed on paid administrative leave in May, after the department received a formal complaint — and negative feedback from across the country — about the way he treated a 17-year-old during a January traffic stop. Footage of the incident that was widely shared on YouTube showed Stinson becoming angry and eventually pulling the uncooperative teen out of his car.

Cody police conducted an internal investigation of Stinson’s actions that wrapped up in June. The city then hired an outside consultant to review the department’s findings, plus its investigation process and policies. City officials announced Friday that Daigle Law Group had completed its review and Stinson would be returning to duty.

“State law and city policies prohibit the disclosure of specific findings or actions regarding personnel,” the city said in a news release, but it offered that, “based on the internal investigation, the Cody Police Department has taken action to address concerns raised by the complaint, and to ensure compliance with Cody PD policies in the future.”

Chief Jason Stafford said the department will review some relatively minor policy changes recommended by the consultant regarding internal affairs.

“We always strive to learn from stuff and be a better, professional department,” Stafford said, adding that both the internal investigation and the external review “found that the traffic stop was lawful.”

A January arrest

Several weeks before he was placed on leave, the police department and city officials had received several complaints about Stinson. A half-dozen people — including the 17-year-old’s mother and younger sister — publicly aired grievances with Stinson at a May 16 Cody City Council meeting.

“I’m just hoping that something is done,” the teen’s mom, Teresa Corley Piper, told the council. “It’s not OK to treat anybody like that, much less our juveniles.”

The calls for action intensified days later when LackLuster — a popular YouTube channel that aims to expose police “corruption and misconduct” — featured footage of Stinson’s Jan. 24 traffic stop. In a narrated video, LackLuster made the case that Stinson had embellished the allegations against the teen and escalated the incident.

The stop took place around 8 a.m. near Cody High School, after Stinson saw the teen fail to yield to a pedestrian who was either in or entering a crosswalk on Beck Street. After the teen pulled over, Stinson told the 17-year-old that he “almost hit” the pedestrian. The grainy dashcam footage posted online shows space between the vehicle and the person, and both the teen’s mother and LackLuster said the officer was exaggerating; city officials said the pedestrian “corroborated” Stinson’s account.

Stinson’s agitation as the teen balked at the commands to provide his license, registration and insurance has also come under criticism.

The teen repeatedly said he wanted to wait for his mother to arrive, but Stinson — who smelled marijuana and suspected the teen was impaired — ordered him out of the car. The teen did not do so and was eventually pulled out by officers, with Stinson briefly putting a hand on his neck. While police are holding the teen’s arms out the window, they continue to yell at him to open the door, though the teen says he can’t.

Police eventually arrested the teen on misdemeanor counts of failure to yield, interference with a peace officer and possession of a controlled substance; a small amount of marijuana, a grinder and a glass pipe were found in the driver’s side door. 

The case was ultimately dismissed in May so the matter could be handled in “the appropriate court,” Park County Attorney Bryan Skoric said in May, calling the dismissal unrelated to Stinson’s actions.

Public criticism

LackLuster’s May video — which had been viewed 714,000 times by Monday — asked whether Stinson had a valid reason for the stop and if he could have been more professional. The channel included a link to the Cody Police Department’s Facebook page, which was flooded with hundreds of critical comments.

The department stopped allowing comments on its Facebook posts following the influx, though angry and critical comments have continued to come in old posts.

More flowed in over the weekend, after another popular YouTube channel that scrutinizes law enforcement actions featured Stinson’s stop just a day before his announced reinstatement.

Audit the Audit’s Thursday video — titled “Lying Cop Gets CAUGHT On Camera CASE DISMISSED” — had garnered more than 428,000 views by Monday.

“Overall, Officer Stinson gets an ‘F’ for maintaining an aggressive and impatient demeanor throughout the encounter, blatantly misrepresenting the nature of the potential traffic violation involved in the stop and yelling at the minor driver to unlock and open the vehicle door while both of his arms were being held out of the window,” Audit the Audit concluded.

The narrators of both videos suggested it may have been the teen’s first run-in with law enforcement, but court records show he’d received citations from six different officers between 2020 and 2022.

Another controversial stop

Meanwhile, Stinson’s actions in an unrelated traffic stop have come under scrutiny from a judge, who recently ruled that the officer exhibited a “bad attitude” and violated a Cody woman’s constitutional rights in April.

Stinson pulled Shaleas Harrison over on Cody’s Wyoming Avenue after observing what he saw as a series of traffic violations. Court records and video footage played in court show the stop started going south before he even reached Harrison’s truck, as her then-fiance/now-husband, Austin Waisanen, parked behind and approached the officer. Stinson told Waisanen to stay away from the stop and then — in what Park County Circuit Court Judge Joey Darrah described as “a terse tone” — told Harrison she’d failed to maintain her lane and asked for her documents.

“Hi, nice to see you, too,” Harrison sarcastically responded.

When Stinson then asked how much she’d had to drink, Harrison said she hadn’t had any, calling the question “pretty f—ing presumptuous.”

“You always talk to the public like this?” she asked later.

“Yup,” Stinson responded.

The conversation remains strained throughout the nearly 20-minute stop, in which Harrison refused to take a breath test or field sobriety tests.

“Both Officer Stinson and defendant demonstrated equally bad attitudes and demeanor during the interaction,” Darrah wrote in a September ruling.

Stinson testified in August that he felt he had enough evidence to arrest Harrison for driving while under the influence, but erred on the side of caution. Stinson instead gave Harrison a citation for failing to maintain a single lane — she’d made a wide turn onto Wyoming Avenue — and told her not to drive for the rest of the night.

“If I can’t verify you’re sober, the vehicle’s staying here,” Stinson added.

However, Waisanen told the officer he couldn’t do that, and after receiving her citation, Harrison followed her attorney/fiance’s advice and drove off. Stinson pursued her, catching up as she ran for her home. At that point, Harrison offered to take a breathalyzer — “I’m sober. This is absurd,” she said — but she was arrested for eluding police. A later breath test at the jail showed no traces of alcohol, Stinson said he was told.

Suppressed evidence

The eluding charge was effectively thrown out by Judge Darrah last month, as he suppressed all the evidence Stinson obtained after he gave Harrison the citation and told her to “have a better night.” While Stinson said he’d observed multiple signs of possible impairment, the judge said that “was nothing more than an unsupported hunch,” concluding the dash and body camera footage didn’t support several of the officer’s allegations. Darrah agreed that Stinson had made a lawful stop for the lane violation, but said he lacked the authority to prevent Harrison from driving.

“It is troubling … that Officer Stinson deprived [Harrison] of her ability to drive her vehicle based solely upon [her] failure to perform tests which he could not constitutionally force upon her in the first place,” Darrah wrote in a 42-page decision last month.

A video posted to Vimeo shows Waisanen was among the group of people who approached Cody police with concerns about Stinson last spring. Harrison’s defense attorney, Branden Vilos, argued at August’s suppression hearing that her stop and January’s stop of the teen “shows a pattern.”

County Attorney Skoric, however, defended Stinson’s actions.

While Stinson couldn’t force Harrison to perform sobriety tests, “that doesn’t mean he was to ignore what he’s observed and what he’s concerned about: community safety,” Skoric argued. He added that, regardless of who was right, “the answer’s not to floor the gas and elude the police officer’s scene,” describing the situation as “chaotic.”

“I think Officer Stinson was being very reasonable with what he was faced with that night,” the prosecutor said.

From his suspension until his reinstatement, Stinson spent more than four months on paid administrative leave.