Grant program accepts Wyoming

CHEYENNE - University of Wyoming students who receive federal Pell Grants will now be eligible for additional grant funding.

Gov. Dave Freudenthal announced Thursday that the U.S. Department of Education had accepted Wyoming's application to join the Academic Competitive Grant program.

To be eligible, students must qualify for Pell Grants and complete a rigorous high school curriculum - a requirement that can be met with Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate courses or by completing prescribed courses in math, science, language arts and other fields.

David Gruen, director of student financial aid at UW, said eligible students could receive $750 on top of their Pell Grants in the first year and $1,300 on top of their Pell Grants in the second year. About 2,300 UW students receive Pell Grants.

"Wyoming has clearly demonstrated with programs like the Hathaway scholarships that money should not stand in the way for students who want to pursue higher education and are willing to work hard to do so," Freudenthal said. "I'm delighted with the news that another option for financial assistance has come through for them."

Probationer gets prison term

CHEYENNE - The man at the center of a Wyoming Supreme Court ruling this January on random searches of probationers has been sentenced to 1.5 to three years in prison.

Colin McAuliffe was sentenced in District Court last week on charges related to methamphetamine possession.

Cheyenne police arrested McAuliffe on Dec. 30, 2003, after pulling him over for failing to signal a turn. After confirming that McAuliffe was on probation for possession of a controlled substance, police asked to search him and his vehicle; McAuliffe refused and was taken to jail. There, police confiscated a pipe with meth, and McAuliffe was caught trying to hand a small bag of meth to a woman leaving the jail.

McAuliffe argued that the search was improper because police had no probable cause and he didn't agree to be searched. He said the probation agreement that subjected him to random searches violated his rights.

But the Wyoming Supreme Court disagreed, saying McAuliffe would have been subject to random searches if he'd been sent to prison on the original drug charge and that "common sense demands that the court is constitutionally permitted to impose that same deprivation while ordering a lesser punishment like probation …."

Officials capture farm escapee

RIVERTON - An inmate who escaped from the Wyoming Honor Farm was quickly caught after investigators received an anonymous tip.

Justin N. Wilkinson, 31, was reported missing after a routine head count Sunday afternoon.

Wilkinson was arrested early Monday morning after authorities received a tip that he was driving a brown Oldsmobile between Riverton and Shoshoni.

Wilkinson had been at the Honor Farm since June 21, when his probation on a Natrona County burglary charge was revoked. He now faces a charge of felony escape.