Aaron Mathew Briggs, a 36-year-old Hispanic/Latino male from Cheyenne, Wyoming, died late on May 22, 2020 after staggering into The Lamp Lounge on West 6th Street with a bleeding wound to his upper body. Witnesses and officers described a frantic scene: Briggs collapsed inside the bar and was rushed to Cheyenne Regional Medical Center, where medical staff pronounced him dead about forty-five minutes later.
As detectives worked backward through the night, their focus centered on the Lariat Motel on Central Avenue. Investigators later said Briggs had gone to a specific room there earlier in the day while under the influence of alcohol, and the encounter quickly soured. According to the police account, he became aggressive with people inside the room, including a resident named Benjamin Ketcham, and was eventually forced out. The separation didn't last. Police said Briggs returned that evening and the mood turned darker, with threats and intimidation aimed at Ketcham and others.
The confrontation, as authorities reconstructed it, hinged on a heavy chain Briggs wore looped over his shoulders. When he refused to leave and Ketcham produced a handgun and again demanded that he go, investigators said Briggs took the chain off and swung it at Ketcham. In that instant, police concluded, Ketcham fired a single shot, striking Briggs in the upper torso. Wounded, Briggs fled the motel area and made it to The Lamp Lounge, where his strength gave out.
In the first days after the shooting, police publicly described an active homicide investigation and, at one point, identified a person of interest while asking the public for information as they tried to pin down what happened at the motel. As the investigation continued, detectives interviewed witnesses, executed search warrants, reviewed surveillance video from nearby businesses, and relied on autopsy findings conducted in Fort Collins, Colorado.
Ketcham was taken into custody and arrested on a warrant accusing him of second-degree murder, a move prosecutors later said was supported by probable cause based on what was known early in the case. Days later, the case pivoted. After investigators and the Laramie County District Attorney's Office reviewed the fully developed evidence, the district attorney dismissed the murder charge, stating that Wyoming's self-defense law provided immunity from prosecution under the specific circumstances they concluded were present. With that dismissal, there were no further charges announced in connection with Briggs's death, and the case ended without a trial or conviction.
