Brittany Taylor

A Cody woman is serving a 50-day jail sentence for reportedly swiping at a young woman with a metal baton last month.

Brittany M. Taylor, 36, received the sentence after pleading no contest to a misdemeanor count of reckless endangering. That was reduced from an original felony count of aggravated assault and battery.

Charging documents say Taylor confronted a 20-year-old woman at Cody’s Mentock Park on the evening of Sept. 11.

The incident was called into Cody police by an off-duty detention deputy from the Park County  Sheriff’s Office, who saw Taylor threatening the woman and waving an ASP collapsible baton.

The victim reportedly told responding Cody Police Officer Mark Martinez that she had been sitting in her car with a juvenile friend when a woman she didn’t know — later identified as Taylor — “approached her car, screaming at her to stay away from another juvenile,” the officer wrote in an affidavit.

Taylor was armed with a baton that she raised and swung at the victim, coming within 6 inches of her face and scaring her, according to the victim’s account. Her passenger told a similar story.

Two other teens at the park told Martinez they saw Taylor arrive at the park with a baton and begin yelling at the victim, nearly hitting her with the weapon; another teen said Taylor called the victim a “f—ing whore” and waved the baton near her face, Martinez wrote.

Disputing the accounts of at least six eyewitnesses, Taylor claimed she hadn’t been carrying a baton. She told police went to Mentock Park “to confront [the victim] about her activities with juveniles” and left when other people got involved. Charging documents don’t detail what Taylor was referring to, but roughly a month later, after a court appearance, Taylor reported that she believed the woman had provided marijuana to a friend’s son. No charges have resulted from that accusation to date.

After she completes the 50 days in jail, Taylor will be released to serve a year of unsupervised probation, with another 130 days of jail time suspended. While on probation, Circuit Court Judge Bruce Waters ordered Taylor to obey the law, pay $220 in court costs and assessments and to have no contact with the victim.

— By CJ Baker