A Fremont County man accused of shooting his wheelchair-using landlord last year announced he will no longer plead insanity in court.
Burdick Nelson Seminole, 59, continues to plead not guilty in the case in which he was accused of shooting Michael Standing Elk as he sat in a wheelchair last August.
Standing Elk was 42 years old.
Seminole’s trial will be held Nov. 12 at the Casper booth of the U.S. District Court for Wyoming.
However, he no longer pleads insanity, even though on April 19 he “pleaded not guilty due to mental illness.”
“(Seminole) notifies Gtransfer i C“we inform you that he is withdrawing his declaration of intent to invoke the insanity defense,” according to a document Seminole attorney Eric Palen filed Thursday in federal court.
Palen did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
Seminole also pleaded not guilty, claiming insanity. ANDIn Wyoming, a person can raise both charges at the same time. His plea of innocence appears to be intact.
A murder case
Seminole faces one count of first-degree murder, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.
The grand jury also indicted him on charges of discharging a firearm during a violent crime (punishable by 10 years to life in prison and a fine of up to $250,000) and causing death by use of a firearm in a violent crime (up to life in prison and up to $250,000).
An evidentiary affidavit accuses Seminole of forcing his way into a crowded home on the Wind River Indian Reservation on the morning of Aug. 8 after its owner, Standing Ełk, had evicted him four months earlier.
The statement said Seminole was evicted based on claims he brought “young women” to the house to drug them.
According to witness interviews later collected by police, Seminole turned on the light in Standing Moose’s room at 8 a.m. and began patting him on the head, asking him to “talk nonsense now.”
Standing Moose told his partner to call the police. He he then got into his wheelchair and drove down the hall, telling other household members to wake up, the statement said.
The Seminole pistol-whipped the standing moose, multiple witnesses later told police. The federal prosecutor is also preparing to call an expert at trial who can confirm this based on Standing Moose’s facial injuries.
One witness told police that the standing moose tried to shoot the Seminole, but its gun jammed.
“OK, I’m done, you win Burdick,” one witness recalls hearing Standing Moose say.
The document says Seminole Then he shot at Standing Moose, and Standing Moose slumped in his wheelchair.
Another tenant left AND in the bedroom and shot Seminole, then hid back in the room, the affidavit said.
Seminole went to the Wind River Family and Community Health Care clinic located on the reservation; and was later hospitalized for a gunshot wound. There, he told police he was fed up with “talking trash,” the affidavit said.
Seminole said that after he was shot, he ran out of the house and grabbed a .45-caliber pistol, but then he lost his memory and when he regained consciousness, he stood in the house and “fired” at Standing Moose, the document says.
“Perforation”
The federal prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Elmore, plans to bring multiple experts to the trial to perform forensic analyses, mainly of blood and gunshot bullets found at the scene.
Dr. William Spafford Smock, a forensic gunshot wound specialist, is scheduled to testify that Standing Elk died of gunshot wounds to the chest and suffered blunt force wounds to his face consistent with pistol whipping, according to documents Elmore filed Oct. 1.
One bullet struck the victim’s upper left chest and penetrated the left and right lungs at an “intermediate” distance, stopping in the upper right back. Another entered the upper left chest, pierced the heart, aorta, esophagus and right lung, exited the upper right back and tore the fabric of the wheelchair, the case files say.
The third bullet hit the victim in the left arm, lodged in the soft tissues, he adds.
The victim’s left ear and neck also had “gunshot wounds,” the document states.
Clair McFarland you can arrive at [email protected].
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