Donna Marie Dozier Klingbeil, a 75-year-old White woman, was at her home in the Wapiti area west of Cody, Wyoming, when a late-summer night in early August 2018 turned into a tragedy that would unravel in court over the next several years. On August 5, after returning to their ranch from a trip connected to buying a truck in Billings, Montana, she and her husband, Dennis Karl Klingbeil, were together inside the house as the evening wore on.
By around 10 p.m., Donna had been shot once in the head.
The first alarm, according to reports and later court records, came from family far away: Dennis contacted his adult son in Florida and conveyed that he had shot Donna and then swallowed pills in an apparent attempt to kill himself. The son called for help, and deputies and medical responders headed to the residence. When law enforcement arrived, they found Donna on the floor with a gunshot wound and Dennis nearby, with a handgun and evidence of pills in the home. Donna was rushed for advanced care, including an airlift to a hospital in Billings, but she died shortly after arrival in the early hours of August 6, 2018. Dennis survived after medical treatment and was taken into custody once he recovered enough to be arrested.
Investigators quickly treated Dennis as the suspect, and prosecutors later alleged the killing was not a sudden accident but the culmination of a long, bitter conflict over money and property. Accounts in court filings and news coverage describe a marriage strained by disputes over how to divide substantial assets and by divorce-related tensions, with the state arguing that the shooting was purposeful and premeditated. Dennis, for his part, maintained that Donna’s death was the result of an accidental discharge tied to his own attempted suicide, and he pleaded not guilty as the case moved toward trial.
In August 2019, a Park County jury rejected the defense’s account and found Dennis Klingbeil guilty of first-degree murder. Reporting on the verdict indicated jurors deliberated only a few hours before returning a unanimous decision, and the sentencing that followed meant he would spend the rest of his life in prison. The conviction did not end the case’s public life: Dennis appealed, challenging aspects of the trial, but the Wyoming Supreme Court upheld the conviction in 2021, citing the strength of the evidence supporting the jury’s conclusion.
