At a hearing last week, family members and supporters of Korinne McKay spoke at length as to how the last two years of the Cody woman’s life — including getting caught with 7,000 fentanyl pills and a pound of meth last fall — were sharply out of character.

McKay had been an outstanding mother before falling in with the wrong crowd, they told the court, and they expressed confidence that the 36-year-old can turn her life around.

After listening to their testimony, District Court Judge Bill Simpson observed that McKay has a lot of hope for her future. However, the judge indicated that a message still needed to be sent about “the most treacherous substance I’ve ever seen.”

“I have to be able to tell society that if you deal in fentanyl, there is a price, and it’s heavy,” Simpson said, “and if you want to take that risk, … you’re going to know what’s going to happen to you.”

He ordered McKay to serve six to 10 years of prison time for four felony drug crimes.

An initial arrest in 2023

According to McKay’s family, her life took a turn in January 2023, when she met and began dating Kristopher M. Wright, 37.

“I did not like him at all for a lot of reasons, and we’re sitting here today because of one,” McKay’s teenage daughter testified at the May 14 hearing.

Wright has a criminal record and a Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation agent recently described him as “a major fentanyl distributor” in the area. McKay’s daughter said her mother “changed drastically” during her time with Wright.

“She went from us [children] being her world to this man being her world,” the teen testified, “and she let this man and these drugs absorb her in ways that I’ve never seen happen before.”

In May 2023, agents with the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation caught McKay selling $200 worth of meth to one of their informants. Then, that July, DCI allegedly caught Wright delivering drugs to McKay at her downtown Cody workplace. They found 26 grams of meth in McKay’s vehicle that appeared to be packaged for resale, plus 28 fentanyl-laced counterfeit oxycodone tablets and other drugs.

Park County prosecutors filed seven charges against McKay and later filed three more against Wright.

McKay made bail after her 2023 arrest, and Deputy Park County Prosecuting Attorney Larry Eichele decided it was “absolutely a probation case”; last fall, he and McKay’s attorney indicated they would resolve her charges with a plea deal.

However, the arrangement unraveled after DCI agents uncovered evidence suggesting that McKay had used Wright’s connections to stay involved with the drug trade.

Recorded calls and a continued investigation

Wright was taken into federal custody on other drug and firearm charges in May 2024, and in the wake of his arrest, DCI has said it believes McKay began obtaining fentanyl from one of Wright’s sources in Colorado. Agents also obtained evidence that McKay worked with Kris Wright’s father, 59-year-old Wayne Wright II.

In late September, DCI Special Agent Shane Reece listened to a telephone call that McKay and Wayne Wright had with Kris Wright, who was being held in the Big Horn County Detention Center.

During the recorded call, McKay said they were staying at another man’s home and put him on the line; when the man stated his address and last name on the call, Reece did a search that indicated the man was a known felon in Aurora, Colorado; the agent concluded that the elder Wright and McKay were on a drug run and obtained a search warrant.

The Park County Sheriff’s Office and DCI stopped Wayne Wright and McKay on their return trip to Cody and found 7,000 fentanyl pills and roughly a pound of meth in their vehicle. Reece said it was one of Park County’s largest fentanyl busts, with the theoretical street value of the drugs approaching $250,000.

McKay reportedly told authorities that 2,000 pills found under her seat belonged to her while Wayne Wright had bought the meth and another 2,000 pills found in the trunk.

As for the other 3,000 pills, those were “weak” ones that they’d unsuccessfully tried to return to Colorado, McKay reportedly told DCI.

At last week’s sentencing hearing, McKay’s defense attorney, Sam Krone, suggested her pills may have only been intended for personal use. However, Reece said text messages, interviews and the sheer number of pills all pointed to distribution. Simpson agreed.

“Don’t lie to yourself anymore,” the judge told McKay. “You know what it was there for: It was there to sell. And when you sell and distribute — or even with the intent to sell and distribute fentanyl — you are poisoning and ruining countless lives.”

‘Back to being Korinne agin’

Following her arrest last fall, McKay said she was disgusted with herself and knew she’d “disappointed everyone in the state of Wyoming and in my community.”

At last week’s sentencing, McKay said she had “reflected on my bad decisions for the last eight months, literally, thinking of every possible way I can better myself.”

She’s attended Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings, a Bible study and taken courses while in jail — all in an effort to stay sober and get back to being the mother her kids deserve, she said.

“I’m really ready to take whatever means necessary to maintain sobriety and continue my journey through recovery,” McKay said.

An AA leader vouched for her sincerity, as did family members. Her mother, April Martinelli, testified that after watching a change for the worse in 2023, she’s seen a reversal following McKay’s September arrest.

“Since she’s been in jail and the drugs have gotten out of her system, we’ve watched her go from someone we don’t know — to still lying to us and trying to be manipulative — to now she’s coming back to being Korinne again,” Martinelli said. “It’s taken a while, but we see her.”

She told the court that the priority must be for McKay to get all the help she needs, “because she needs to be strong for herself and for these kids.”

Probation versus prison

McKay asked to be released on five years of supervised probation so she could complete inpatient treatment, the Park County drug court program and stay at a sober living home. Krone said such a sentence would “protect the community and also start rebuilding this family.”

However, the prosecutor argued that McKay’s conduct merited eight-to-10 or nine-to-11 years behind bars.

“We’ve had deaths in this county, deaths in adjoining counties that were fentanyl overdoses,” Eichele said, “and based on that public safety concern alone and that message that we would like to send to the general public, the state took a position that this was a prison case now.”

He noted that a probation and parole agent also recommended incarceration.

At the tail end of the three-hour hearing, Simpson said he, too, had noticed a positive change in McKay’s attitude in recent months — and the extensive support she’d received.

“You have so many things in your favor,” the judge said, “but we have to get beyond this hurdle.”

Simpson said he would “seriously consider” reducing McKay’s six- to 10-year term in the future. However, he also warned that the crimes could have resulted in decades of prison time if she had taken her cases to trial.

As for Wayne Wright, he’s accepted a plea deal that calls for him to receive an eight- to 10-year sentence. He has downplayed his role in last fall’s drug run, testifying over the winter that his role was to “assist” McKay. He is slated to be sentenced on June 19. 

Kris Wright, meanwhile, just accepted a deal from federal prosecutors in Montana and is set to plead guilty to two felony charges at a hearing today (Tuesday) in Billings.