Scott Abraham

A Big Horn County man who secretly recorded his female coworkers in a workplace bathroom in 2019 is headed back to prison.

Scott Abraham, 55, served nearly two-and-a-half years in prison on felony counts of voyeurism before being released to supervised probation. However, Abraham was caught violating multiple terms of his probation in late 2023, including by accessing pornography and failing to complete required sex offender treatment.

After prosecutors sought to revoke his probation and had him arrested, Abraham caught up on his requirements and stayed out of trouble. His efforts persuaded his probation agent and, initially, the Park County Attorney’s Office, that he deserved another shot at probation. However, the four women he’d secretly recorded insisted Abraham should be returned to prison, and at a hearing last month, District Court Judge Bill Simpson agreed.

Noting the women’s accounts of the lasting damage that Abraham caused to their lives, the judge said there was “a price to be paid.”  

“... everybody does the right thing when they know that jail is looking at him in the face,” Simpson said at the Dec. 9 hearing. “I gave that opportunity [for probation] when jail was looking him in the face and he violated it. So now I really have no choice.”

In an order issued earlier this month, the judge ordered Abraham to serve another one to two years in prison.

The crime

It was in June 2019 that a hidden camera was discovered in the woman’s bathroom of Abraham’s Powell workplace. The device was quickly identified as Abraham’s and he admitted to police that he’d placed the camera there, “hoping to get something out of it.”

While Abraham said it was the first time he’d hidden the camera in the bathroom, a Powell police investigation concluded that it was at least the second time, as they found images from both that day and August 2018. Four women were secretly recorded in states of undress, charging documents say.

In 2020, the Park County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office offered a plea deal calling for two to four years of prison time, but the victims asked the court to reject the arrangement and impose the maximum of four to eight years instead. Simpson ultimately went along with the plea bargain, but only after insisting it be amended to include four years of supervised probation.

Abraham began that probation in February 2023, after serving two years and roughly five months behind bars. His probation agent issued a series of requirements, including that he only access the internet with pre-approved, monitored devices, not possess pornography and complete sex offender treatment. In November 2023, however, Probation Agent Stephanie Brieg reported that Abraham had failed to follow through with the required treatment, owned several undisclosed internet-capable devices, used a tablet to access online pornography and possessed several books, CDs and DVDs with erotic images. He was arrested in February 2024.

Due to the nature of the violations, Brieg initially recommended that Abraham be sent back to prison. But after Abraham was released on bond and began faithfully attending treatment, the agent suggested it would be appropriate to put him back on probation, and the county attorney’s office initially agreed. However, the four women objected, calling for Abraham to be returned to prison.

Victims describe lasting impact

In a statement to the court, the victims expressed continuing concern about Abraham — and the process.

“This case has been extremely frustrating and I have zero faith in our justice system,” one of the women wrote.

She said she believed Abraham was only abiding by the rules because “he knows that his freedom depends on it” and called on Simpson to “send that pervert back to prison where he belongs.”

Another victim wrote at length about the impact of the crime — including ongoing distrust and anger toward men and a constant feeling that she’s being followed and watched. She said she’s had to purchase security cameras and attend therapy.

“I understand Scott Abraham won't always be in prison, but I would really appreciate some time to start emotionally healing from the damage he’s caused before he gets to be a free man,” she wrote.

A third woman said that when Abraham was initially released from prison, she was concerned enough that she moved in with her boyfriend and purchased a handgun.

The fourth victim also shared her fears with the court, saying she sees Abraham as “a long term threat to any community.”

Lesson learned?

For his part, Abraham said he’d learned his lesson. 

Until his most recent arrest, Abraham said he didn’t fully appreciate the grip that pornography continued to have on his life.

“After my violation, it was blatantly clear that not only was I hurting myself, but I was hurting my family, my friends and vicariously I was re-injuring the women that I had victimized previously,” he said.

“I know that I hurt them … I can only imagine how badly,” Abraham said of his former coworkers. “And I want to make it so that I never hurt anyone like that again.”

He said he’d been meeting with a therapist and attending pornography addiction classes, seeking to change his mindset and become a person who people can trust.

Abraham asked the court for the opportunity to improve, increase his mental health and “make amends by being a good member of society.”

His defense attorney and cousin, Craig Abraham, argued that would be best for everyone.

“I just don't believe that it benefits society to just throw our arms up and say, ‘Go to prison,’” Craig Abraham said. “I think it scratches the itch for a victim — and the victims have every right to be disgusted and angry and upset — but at the end of the day, your honor, if this man does not finish his programming the way he needs to, we might get something worse coming back out in a couple of years.”

‘It has to be done’

Deputy Park County Attorney Laura Newton, however, joined the victims’ calls for incarceration at the hearing, describing the case as “incredibly disturbing.”

The fact that Scott Abraham initially failed to get a psychosexual evaluation and attend treatment, “those things say to me that he does not care about getting better or the victims,” Newton said.

That Abraham is “finally” doing what he’s supposed to shouldn’t mitigate what he did, the prosecutor argued.

Simpson said the defendant had put him in a very difficult situation. The judge said he wants Abraham to get help and do better, but noted he’d already offered an opportunity.

“Under these circumstances, this needs to be done, it has to be done,” Simpson said, and he ordered two to four years of prison time. However, that was too stiff a penalty.

At the time Abraham committed the crimes, the maximum sentence for voyeurism was two years in prison, so that’s the most time Simpson could impose for a probation violation. When Simpson issued his formal sentencing order on Jan. 10, he had revised the prison term.

Thanks in part to the advocacy for the women who were victimized by Abraham, the Wyoming Legislature increased the potential penalties for this type of voyeurism in 2021. A conviction now carries up to five years of prison time.