If you or someone you know is in immediate danger of harming themselves, please call 911. If you or someone you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts, call the U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988 or text “WYO” to 741-741 for the Crisis Text Line.
GILLETTE, Wyo. — Sometimes following the Golden Rule involves looking past an orange jumpsuit.
About five years ago, a 14-year-old student at Sage Valley Junior High School told another student that he’d brought guns to school and planned to carry out a shooting threat, according to court documents. The other student immediately reported the incident to the principal, who in 2018 was Terry Quinn. Quinn found the 14-year-old student and asked him to hand over the gun and ammunition. Quinn brought the student, Dale Warner, to the athletic director’s office and told the secretary to call the police while he retrieved the second gun from the student’s locker. Quinn left the assistant principal and the athletic director in charge of Warner.
Warner was charged as an adult for nine counts of felony attempted first-degree murder after planning and nearly carrying out the shooting threat at Sage Valley Junior High.
Warner’s request to transfer his case to juvenile court was denied, and the Wyoming Supreme Court upheld the Campbell County District Court’s decision when Warner appealed, according to court documents. Warner was sentenced on June 25, 2020, to four to five years for possession of a deadly weapon with unlawful intent, according to the Wyoming Department of Corrections.
Warner was incarcerated at Sussex II State Prison from Nov. 20, 2020, to Aug. 9, 2022, Virginia Department of Corrections Director of Communications Kyle Gibson said March 24. At any given time, there are fewer than 10 juveniles adjusted as adult inmates who are housed at that prison. Warner was enrolled in academic courses during his time at Sussex II, but no further academic information for inmates is permitted due to Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act regulations.
That prison, in Waverly, Virginia, is a level 4 facility for inmates with long sentences, usually life or multiple life sentences and inmates who were difficult to manage at lower security levels, according to PrisonPro.
Warner becomes eligible for parole Dec. 19, 2024, and his projected discharge date is April 21, 2025, according to the Wyoming Department of Corrections.
While Scott Warner, Dale’s adoptive father, has moved away from Gillette, he said he has nothing but respect for two men who have been in contact with Dale over the past several years: Quinn, who’s now principal of Thunder Basin High School, and Lyle Austin, who has done jail ministry for New Life Church in Gillette for almost a decade. Austin also owns a Farmers Insurance Agency in Gillette. Scott said both are good men.
At a hearing, Quinn, who was among those Dale said he was planning to shoot, testified that he didn’t believe Dale would have shot anyone and that he believed Dale shouldn’t be sent to an adult prison, according to court documents.
In an interview in March, Quinn said he still believes Dale shouldn’t have been sent to an adult prison, as he could have been easily, appropriately punished in a juvenile setting. He said he believes Dale wouldn’t have carried out the threats, but rather just wanted to go to prison.
Quinn said Scott reached out to him and asked whether he’d be willing to contact Dale, and Quinn agreed. Quinn began writing letters to Dale every Sunday, telling Dale about the weather and news from Gillette and asking Dale how he was doing.
“I told him to hang in there, stay positive, people believe in you, I believe in you,” he said.
One day, Quinn heard back from Dale. Dale told Quinn that he was sorry for everything that happened and he was never going to hurt anyone.
“And so I wrote him back and I said, ‘You know, you don’t need to apologize, Dale. You know, it is what it is. Let’s just move on,” Quinn said. “Let’s make the best of the situation.”
Quinn said for about a year or two, he tried to send Dale a letter at least every two weeks, without expecting or receiving response letters. Then, he heard from Scott. Dale wanted to talk with Quinn on the phone.
So, the three of them did. They had brief chats about how things were going in Gillette and how Dale was holding up in prison.
Quinn learned from Scott that Dale wanted to become a wildland firefighter and would be able to complete training. Dale got his wish to return to Wyoming; he’s now at Wyoming Honor Conservation Camp & Boot Camp, a low-risk work facility.
Quinn’s been waiting for approval to see him. He’s looking forward to shaking Dale’s hand and reminding him that he has to serve out the remainder of his time, land on his feet and believe in himself. He said all kids deserve an opportunity for a second chance.
“We all need that,” he said.
Quinn said that he hopes Dale’s working toward a GED and that he’ll ask about Dale’s goals and dreams.
He said that by writing to Dale, he was simply doing what anyone would do: encouraging another person.
Austin told County 17 in March that he met Dale when the then-14-year-old was in Campbell County’s detention center following the Sage Valley crime. He said he took notice of Dale because the older teenagers seemed to make him their leader. He also noticed that Dale was unusually intelligent.
Austin said he believes that it was on his fourth visit with the teen that he saw Dale tell another teenager in detention that when he got to prison, he was going to be a prison thug.
“I got about 3 inches from his nose, and I said, ‘You don’t know what the h— a thug is, so quit acting like one, and you’re going to be better off if you just self-educate and become something that God wants you to be. So drop the horse-pucky, we’re done,'” he said.
Dale cried.
“Dale and I got to know each other, and he eventually admitted to me that he wasn’t going to shoot anybody,” Austin said. “He was looking for attention.”
Austin told Dale that if he wanted attention, he should try to make a difference in people’s lives, and that he needed to learn from his experience and use his intelligence, ambition and ability to lead people for good purposes after he left prison.
After Dale was sentenced, he and Austin talked about once a week for six months via the phone until they lost contact. Austin said he keeps in contact with all the inmates that he meets at the county jail if they want to keep in touch, and the roughly 5% who do typically end up being the same 5% who end up leading lives of success after jail.
Austin said Dale told him that he was teaching fellow prisoners what Austin had told him about how to be a good person.
“[Lyle] kept my son from losing faith in God,” Scott said in March. “He also kept my son from attempting suicide in the juvenile detention center for the second time.”
Austin said he considers his ministry to prisoners part of his Christian discipleship.
