PINEDALE – It took the jury of six less than 30 minutes of deliberation to find Sublette County Sheriff’s Office (SCSO) Deputy Katherine “Kam” Peterson guilty of two misdemeanor charges on Wednesday, one for stalking and one for electronic impersonation of her former subordinate Shannon Gehlhausen.

The two-day Circuit Court trial began Tuesday morning with jury selection, followed by testimony from most of the state’s 11 witnesses the rest of the day. Wednesday finished off the prosecution’s witnesses before the defense team called two witnesses of its own.

Each side did its best to paint a different picture of the events and circumstances that ultimately led to the criminal charges.

Both sides, however, agreed on a few basic facts – that the work environment at the SCSO started off friendly in January 2015, when former sheriff Stephen Haskell took office, but ultimately digressed into division and turmoil as both civil and criminal charges were levied against Haskell in 2016.

“Shannon Gehlhausen and Katherine Peterson found themselves on two separate sides of the rift,” said defense attorney Joanne Sweeney.

In addition, both sides acknowledged that Peterson did, in fact, initiate a series of emails that were sent to Gehlhausen’s work email address, mostly over the course of four days in August 2016.

According to the defense, the emails – related to weight loss, sexual health, skin health, psychiatric information, as well as an extramarital affair site – were sent as “a silly prank” that got “out of control.”  

“It was childish, really, but was it criminal? No,” said Sweeney.

For the state, however, the emails were part of a pattern of behavior that demonstrated Peterson’s “malevolent obsession” with Gehlhausen, according to Sublette County Attorney Clay Kainer.

“The state believes this is a very straightforward case about harassing and about obsession,” Sublette County Deputy Attorney Carly Anderson said in her opening remarks.

The prosecution’s witness list included a wide range, from a criminal intelligence analyst for Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation (DCI) and two DCI special agents to Sheriff K.C. Lehr and Peterson’s former friend Ranae Pape. The defense’s witness list included two former members of Haskell’s command staff – former SCSO undersheriff Mark Ferrell and former captain Wes Johnston, since demoted to deputy.

Over the course of the trial, the state set out to establish the pattern of stalking by demonstrating a consistent effort by Peterson to harass Gehlhausen, starting in April 2016, when Peterson set up a camera hidden in a clock in her former office. The state argued it was pointed directly at Gehlhausen’s desk that sat just outside Peterson’s door. The defense said it was set up, with approval from SCSO command staff, to capture anybody who might enter her office without permission. Pape later testified that she was sent at least one photo from that camera that showed Gehlhausen walking into Peterson’s office.

By June 2016, Gehlhausen discovered the camera and grew concerned, she testified.

“I felt violated,” she testified on Tuesday. “I felt like I was being secretly recorded without knowing about it.”

That same month, Haskell was removed from office. Peterson, meanwhile, was demoted to deputy and put on road duty by the newly appointed Lehr, who selected Gehlhausen to take her place as the top office administrator.

“Shannon took her job and she was obsessed,” said Kainer.

Starting Aug. 27, Gehlhausen started receiving seemingly random emails through her work account – each specifically targeted to her.

“I would have thought it was spam (junk mail) if it didn’t have my name across the top,” she testified, adding that she found it odd but wasn’t overly concerned yet. “I saved them and went about my day.”

Then, on the morning of Aug. 30, she received an email from AshleyMadison.com – a dating website dedicated to extramarital affairs – that welcomed her to the site and thanked her for joining.

“It seemed to be more of an escort service than a dating website,” she said, often looking at the jury during her testimony.

Later that morning, she received a second email from Ashley Madison, this time telling her that two men in the region were interested in making a connection.

Amid a tearful testimony, Gehlhausen said she was “embarrassed, shocked, worried that the (SCSO) administration wouldn’t believe I didn’t sign up for these,” adding that she was worried about her marriage and had to explain the situation to her husband.

“This is an affair website and I just wanted my husband to believe me,” she said.

According to Gehlhausen, those two emails, in particular, took a physical toll and she started having trouble eating and sleeping. She “started taking Zantec” as well – a medication for heartburn and stomach ailments.

During its cross-examination, the defense painted a picture that perhaps Gehlhausen was the one obsessed with Peterson, citing a journal Gehlhausen started keeping the day after Haskell took office in which she documented many of Peterson’s daily words and actions.

Gehlhausen defended the journal, saying she kept it because there were “comments by the command staff that just seemed unprofessional” with the intention to “keep notes of things that were said.”

The defense also questioned Gehlhausen as to why she didn’t simply unsubscribe to the emails when she first received them if they were so bothersome, instead of waiting for “a week, week and a half.”

“These were on my work email,” she said, adding she had more important things to do than to “spend my day unsubscribing to emails I did not subscribe to.”

After receiving the Ashley Madison emails, Lehr got involved, ultimately obtaining an IP address from the website’s parent company that linked the emails to the home of Katherine and Josh Peterson in Big Piney. Since Josh was also employed by the SCSO, the investigation was turned over to DCI, which obtained a search warrant for the Petersons’ electronics and ultimately linked Peterson’s cell phone – using its browser and cookie histories – to the various websites that generated the emails. DCI also linked the timing of Peterson’s interactions on the websites, in which the phone data showed direct input of Gehlhausen’s email and other personal information, to the times the emails were sent.

By November, formal charges had been filed against Peterson.

In closing arguments Wednesday afternoon, the prosecution reinforced its claim that the evidence all pointed to a pattern of harassment and electronic impersonation that “caused or intended to cause” harm to Gehlhausen.

“This is stalking in the 21^st century,” Kainer said, pointing to Peterson’s attempt to “(hide) behind the Internet. She hid behind anonymity.”

The defense, however, tried to erode the notion of “substantial harm” that the prosecution emphasized.

“It wasn’t that deep; it was just a prank,” said defense counsel in her closing statement, adding that it was “14 emails over the course of two days. This wasn’t months. This wasn’t years. This wasn’t even a few weeks. Is that catty? Yes. Is that stalking? No.”

The prosecution got the last word, rebutting the defense’s arguments.

“This was stalking, plain and simple,” Kainer said. “Ms. Gehlhausen took her job and (Peterson) couldn’t stand that. … It only becomes a prank when the defendant knows she’s caught.”

Less than 30 minutes after retreating to deliberate, the jury returned with its verdict – guilty on both counts.

Circuit Court Judge Curt Haws then set a date for the sentencing hearing, which will be May 23. Peterson now faces up to six months in jail and up to a $750 fine for stalking, and up to a year in jail and up to a $1,000 fine for unlawful impersonation through electronic means.