Laramie, Wyo. – An anonymous tipster on horseback led authorities to the remote hideout of a former military sniper accused of fatally shooting his wife while she sang in a band.
As searchers closed in, David Munis, 36, shot himself with a rifle in the chest. Munis was found near a small pickup truck camper about five miles outside the search area, according to Albany County Sheriff’s Lt. Michael Garcia.
Munis was flown to a hospital and pronounced dead, ending a day-long manhunt in the Rogers Canyon area about 10 miles northeast of Laramie.
“I’m glad it’s over,” Garcia said. “People in the community can feel more at rest. People in Rogers Canyon can feel more at ease.”
Sheriff’s officials said they knew little about the anonymous rider who called 911 on a cellphone. But they said he didn’t live in the area at the foot of the Laramie Range where he was riding around 7 p.m.
Along with the rifle Munis used to kill himself, officers found near him a box of personal items with notes written on it, a .22-caliber handgun, several bullets for the gun, two empty military rations packages and a backpack.
Munis’ estranged wife, Robin Munis, 40, was killed at an Old Chicago restaurant in Cheyenne just after midnight Saturday. She was singing with a classic-rock and country group when a bullet pierced a plate glass door and hit her in the head, killing her.
The Munises were recently separated, and Robin Munis had contacted police just hours before she was shot to complain that he was making harassing calls to her cellphone.
Investigators said it was unclear whether the shot that killed her came from the restaurant parking lot, about 25 yards away, or from an open green space, roughly 100 yards off. Witnesses reported seeing David Munis’ black Dodge Dakota pickup truck leaving the scene.
Police had suspected from the outset that Munis, a devoted hunter and outdoorsman, would flee into terrain where his training and experience could give him the advantage.
On Monday night, Munis’ truck was found about 10 miles northeast of Laramie, which is about 50 miles west of Cheyenne. About 75 heavily armed officers searched the area Tuesday.
The search had covered rough, rocky sagebrush country speckled with ponderosa pine. But Munis ended up closer to the relatively flat Laramie Valley.
Garcia said that after spotting Munis, the man on horseback made for a nearby ridge about two miles away from the camper.
“He got away. He didn’t want to be near it,” he said.
Munis had been charged with first-degree murder earlier Tuesday.
Also Tuesday, police said they’d found a handwritten note of about six pages, addressed to “Everyone,” was found at Munis’ home.
“I’m calling it a near-confession,” Cheyenne police Capt. Jeff Schulz said. “He does not come out and say, ‘I did it.'” The police spokesman would not give details.
Munis has been a member of the Wyoming Army National Guard since 2003, was previously in the Army and was a 2001 graduate of the Army Sniper School at Fort Benning, Ga., according to the National Guard.
He was assigned to an infantry regiment at Ft. Campbell, Ky., according to Lt. Col. Kevin V. Arata, public affairs officer with the U.S. Army Human Resources Command. Arata said he couldn’t determine from Munis’ military records if he was ever in combat.
