Sandra Frisby

A Billings woman who stole thousands of dollars worth of merchandise from the Cody Walmart has been ordered to serve three to five years in prison.

Sandra R. Frisby, 36, received the sentence last month for stealing nearly 100 items from the store in April 2022; the merchandise, which was reportedly taken in two separate trips, was valued at close to $5,500.

Walmart staff confronted Frisby as she left the store with her second cart-full of stolen goods, charging documents say, but she fled.

Cody Police Officer Tyler Eubanks caught up with Frisby a few blocks away. In an affidavit recounting the incident, Eubanks said the suspect admitted to stealing the items with the intent of reselling them in Montana.

When asked if she knew the value of what she’d taken, “Frisby replied it is a felony because it is over $1,000 worth of goods,” Eubanks wrote.

The Park County Attorney’s Office charged her with felony theft totaling $1,000 or more, along with a felony count of burglary (alleging she entered the store with the intent to commit a felony) and a misdemeanor count of possessing a controlled substance, which related to a small amount of marijuana found in her van.

Prosecutors said Frisby had been banned from all Walmart locations in March 2021, after she shoplifted from the Laurel, Montana store; she was also suspected of having stolen items from the Billings location in 2021, Eubanks wrote.

When Frisby was stopped in Cody on April 2, 2022, police found 87 stolen items in her minivan; Walmart personnel determined she’d taken a total of 93 items valued at $5,473.53.

Frisby was released on a $25,000 surety bond a couple weeks after her arrest, but was re-arrested in Billings in November 2022. During a traffic stop, a trooper with the Montana Highway Patrol found a small amount of meth, a scale with residue, various drug paraphernalia and eight tramadol pills in her vehicle, court records say. After spending more than six months in the Yellowstone County Detention Center, she received a probationary sentence on a felony count of criminal possession of dangerous drugs. She was sent back to Cody in June.

After a few more months in the Park County Detention Center, Frisby resolved her case on Sept. 19 by pleading guilty to all three charges. District Court Judge Bill Simpson finalized the sentence in an Oct. 24 order. The 180 days Frisby had already served in jail on the Park County case will count toward her three- to five-year sentence.

As of Monday, she was waiting to be transported to Wyoming Department of Corrections custody.