Sentence handed down in animal cruelty case

A local man under federal supervision after an investigation turned up a personal arsenal containing illegal firearms pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor animal cruelty charge in Lincoln County District Court late last month.

Mark Allen Kilgore, 63, initially pleaded not guilty to felony criminal mischief and criminal endangerment charges. He changed his plea Nov. 29 after prosecutors amended the charges.

District Judge Matthew Cuffe handed down a suspended one-year sentence to Kilgore, who already is under five years of probation after pleading guilty to possession of a machine gun in federal court in October 2020, that same day. Prosecutors said they recommended the sentence after speaking with the victim.

Authorities first began looking into Kilgore after investigating the shooting of a neighbor’s horses in June 2020. At the time, surveillance camera footage of the incident showed a rifle toting man approach and aim at the animals. The horses' owner identified the individual in the footage as Kilgore, who lived nearby on Vanderwood Road, court documents said.

On July 1, Deputy Brent Faulkner met with Kilgore, who denied the allegations, in his home. After receiving a search warrant, Faulkner found a spent brass casing matching the type of round pulled from the injured horse as well as a half empty box of the ammunition. In an affidavit, Faulkner noted that the brand was advertised as “ultrasonic and ultra quiet.”

Armed with enough evidence to charge Kilgore with aggravated animal cruelty and criminal endangerment, both felonies, Faulkner placed him under arrest. But the search of his home, according to documents filed in federal court, also turned up multiple silencers and short-barreled rifles in violation of state law.

Local deputies contacted the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosive’s Denver office after the discovery. Officials secured a second search warrant for silencers and firearms, according to an affidavit written by Kyle Solon, a special agent with the ATF. That sweep turned up several machine guns, Solon wrote.

According to Solon’s investigation, Kilgore owned four registered silencers. But the machine guns lacked registration, he wrote.

ATF agents searched the home on July 2, 2020. They turned up three machine guns, 10 short-barreled rifles, three short-barreled shotguns, 32 silencers, two “destructive devices,” more than 100 other firearms and roughly 6,000 pounds of ammunition, according to court documents. Of the firearms seized in the raid, three had the serial numbers removed, according to Solon’s affidavit.

Kilgore eventually pleaded guilty to possession of a machine gun in federal court. In exchange, prosecutors dropped charges of possession of an unregistered firearm and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number.

In a March 2021 judgement, Kilgore was sentenced to five years on federal probation and ordered to pay a court fee. He also surrendered his personal arsenal and firearm accessories. The list of seized weapons stretches across three pages.

Prosecutors in Lincoln County dropped Kilgore’s local charges while his federal court case was ongoing without prejudice, meaning they could file them again at a later date. He was arraigned in district court a second time in August 2021.

During his sentencing last month, Kilgore expressed remorse for his actions and attributed poor decision making to substance abuse.

“I feel bad about my poor choices,” he told the court. “I was mixing drugs and alcohol.”