Randall Bailey

When Cody police found apparent pipe bombs at a stalking suspect’s home last fall, they called federal authorities for help. And after conducting their own investigation, the feds have decided to take up the case against Randall T. Bailey.

Bailey has been incarcerated since November, when Cody officers arrested the 65-year-old for allegedly burglarizing his ex-wife’s car and violating a court order to stay away from her.

Bailey was initially charged with felony counts of stalking and burglary plus a couple misdemeanors in Park County courts. But the U.S. Attorney’s Office has now tacked on several more charges in connection with the dozens of weapons found on Bailey’s property east of Cody.

Court documents unsealed Thursday show Bailey is facing three felonies in Wyoming’s U.S. District Court. They allege he possessed a handgun in violation of a court order and had illegal explosives, suppressors and a machine pistol.

The crimes are theoretically punishable by up to 35 years of prison time — more than the 21.5-year maximum he’s been facing on the state-level charges.

Bailey’s bond had been set at $550,000 in Park County. In January, Deputy Park County Prosecuting Attorney Larry Eichele called it, “the poster child case for, specifically, victim safety and public safety.”

Federal prosecutors similarly want to keep Bailey locked up while their case proceeds. In a court filing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Paige Hammer asserted there are no conditions that would reasonably assure the public’s safety if Bailey is released and that there’s a serious risk he would flee.

At a brief hearing on Thursday afternoon, U.S. Magistrate Judge Michael Shickich ordered Bailey to remain in custody pending further proceedings.

Two years of stalking allegations

Park County prosecutors say Bailey harassed and stalked his ex-wife from the time he was served with divorce papers in January 2023 until his arrest last November.

Circuit Court Judge Joey Darrah had sided with Bailey’s ex and issued a pair of protection orders during that time period. They came amid allegations that Bailey had planted a tracking device on his former spouse’s car, followed her to the Cody Rec Center, tried creating problems for her at work and made vague threats.

For his part, Bailey contended that his actions were being misconstrued or, in some cases, made up. Bailey asserted that his ex was making police reports to harass him and charged that Darrah was biased against him.

However, Darrah stayed on the case, and after hours of testimony, he concluded that the evidence supported Bailey’s ex-wife.

For example, the judge said he believed that, shortly after the couple’s divorce was finalized in late summer 2023, Bailey may have put a nail beneath his ex’s tire and sent complaints to her licensing board and her alma mater in an effort to retaliate against and harass her.

Darrah also took issue with news articles that Bailey provided to his ex’s attorney last year. The stories discussed the 2012 kidnapping and murder of Sherry Arnold of Sydney, and the 1997 disappearance of Amy Wroe Bechtel of Lander. Like Bailey’s ex-wife, both women were runners and they went missing while out exercising.

Bailey said he provided the documents because he planned to say in court that his ex had pre-existing fears about those and other cases, and that they were what originally prompted him to purchase tracking devices.

However, Bailey’s former spouse said she thought the articles were intended to scare her; Darrah similarly considered them to be a “veiled threat” that was intended to cause distress.

An order to stay away

At an April 2024 hearing, the judge issued a three-year order of protection, barring Bailey from possessing any firearms and from coming within 150 feet of his ex’s home.

“I don’t want to have her call the police on you because she thinks you’re a foot closer than you should be,” Darrah said. He said he hoped the order “puts an end to all this.”

In the ensuing months, however, Cody police said they investigated a couple more alleged violations. And despite Darrah explicitly saying he didn’t want Bailey pulling up to his ex’s house during custody exchanges, he did so a half-dozen times, charging documents say. 

More significantly, on Nov. 10, 2024, a surveillance camera captured Bailey stopping in front of the woman’s Cody home around 5:30 a.m. The footage allegedly showed him rifling through the woman’s vehicle, taking something from inside it and then leaving.

Cody police arrested Bailey the following day. Inside his Chrysler Voyager, police found an employee ID badge belonging to his ex-wife, plus a stun gun and a fully loaded Ruger .357 revolver.

Firearms and explosives

A subsequent search of Bailey’s home on Musser Road turned up 29 more firearms — including an alleged machinegun — and two apparent pipe bombs. The devices measured roughly 1 1/2 inches in diameter and 6 inches long, with end caps and a green wire fuse. 

Their discovery prompted Cody police to contact both a regional bomb team from Casper and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).

The devices were later analyzed at the ATF’s National Center for Explosives Training and Research in Huntsville, Alabama. Center personnel concluded in March that they “were designed as weapons and would be properly identified as improvised explosive bombs,” according to charging documents.

Additionally, federal authorities took an interest in a Cobray brand pistol that was found with a homemade suppressor attached. A technical examination concluded it was “an open-bolt M10-type firearm, which means it is a machinegun according to the Gun Control Act,” ATF Special Agent Andrew St. John wrote in an affidavit.

It was privately made, with a receiver “of unknown origin” and apparently manufactured from an unfinished receiver flat, St. John wrote.

When a firearm enforcement officer loaded five rounds into the weapon, the first two rounds “fired automatically” with a single trigger pull, the affidavit says; however, it reportedly took separate pulls to fire the third and fourth rounds.

As for the attached suppressor, it appeared to meet the federal definition of a silencer, the affidavit says. The charges indicate authorities also found a second unregistered suppressor at the property.

Conflict with the judge

When investigators searched Bailey’s phone, Eichele has said they found video footage of Judge Darrah working out and photos of his vehicle and license; the prosecutor asserted that the items show Bailey was “stalking” the judge.

However, Bailey’s defense attorney, Sam Krone, countered in January that the proceedings had become “a trial by innuendo and a trial by, ‘Well, this is all the things that are out there lurking that may look very poorly for Mr. Bailey’ without actual proof …”

Court records show it was not a secret that Bailey was recording the judge: Last year, as part of an attempt to get Darrah removed from the protection order case, Bailey presented footage from his body-worn camera of Darrah exercising at the Cody Rec Center. Bailey said he believed the judge had been watching him at the rec center and that he “somewhat felt threatened.”

His ex’s attorney, however, countered that Bailey only brought the motion “because he doesn’t like the previous decisions rendered by this court.”

Darrah said it seemed like the motion was brought simply because they happened to be at the gym at the same time and he declined to recuse himself.

No charges have been filed in connection with Bailey’s images of the judge.

State and federal charges

Bailey’s two Park County cases have effectively been put on hold to allow the federal case to proceed.

"We have the option to revive them down the road if the circumstances warrant it," Eichele said in a Tuesday email.

Cody Police Lt. Juston Wead told the Tribune that his agency hopes the county attorney’s office continues to pursue those charges.

As for the new federal case, Bailey is set to reappear before Magistrate Shickich today (Tuesday) for a preliminary examination and detention hearing, where the judge will decide whether to keep Bailey in custody. He’s currently being held at the Platte County Sheriff’s Office Detention Center in Wheatland, which has a contract to hold federal inmates.

(Editor's note: This version has been updated to clarify the status of the state-level cases.)