Judge Kerri Johnson sentenced Luka Wade Rasmussen to 10 to 16 years after a hearing focused on marijuana use, a gun laser and the death of 16-year-old Riley Sears.
CASPER, Wyo. — A sentencing hearing in Natrona County turned on stark language and simple facts Tuesday as Judge Kerri Johnson sent Luka Wade Rasmussen to prison for 10 to 16 years in the death of Riley Sears, a 16-year-old friend shot during a night of gaming and gunplay.
The most quoted line from the hearing came from prosecutor Dan Itzen, who argued that the case was not complicated by mystery or competing stories about who pulled the trigger. Rasmussen had already pleaded guilty in October to involuntary manslaughter. What remained was the question of punishment. The state argued that Riley died because Rasmussen mixed marijuana, bravado and a loaded firearm, then pointed the gun’s laser with a round in the chamber. The defense asked the court to impose a shorter sentence and to weigh Rasmussen’s age and remorse. Johnson’s ruling showed that she accepted the state’s core view that the death flowed from reckless conduct serious enough to require years in state prison.
The shooting happened Feb. 12, 2025, at a home on the 4000 block of East 8th Street in Casper. Prosecutors said Rasmussen, Riley and another teenage boy were spending time together, playing video games and smoking marijuana. At some point, Rasmussen began handling a pistol and aiming its laser. Riley was then shot in the head. That bare sequence of events gave the case unusual clarity. There was no claim that Riley had attacked anyone. There was no evidence in public reporting of a larger fight breaking out in the room. The state instead described a setting in which a deadly weapon was turned into part of a casual teenage hangout. Police recovered guns from the property, and testimony at hearings helped establish who brought which weapon and where officers found them after the shot was fired.
At sentencing, Itzen argued that the case should be understood through the ordinary rules people learn long before they are old enough to buy a handgun. Do not point a gun at a person. Do not handle a loaded firearm carelessly. Do not mix intoxication and weapons. He told the judge that Rasmussen had previously been warned about pointing his pistol’s laser at others, a detail the prosecution used to show that the fatal shot was preceded by earlier risky behavior, not a one-time lapse without warning signs. Defense attorney Marty Scott tried to narrow the court’s focus. He described Rasmussen as young, capable of change and deserving of a sentence that left room for treatment and rehabilitation. Rasmussen then addressed the court directly, apologized and said he took full responsibility.
Those competing presentations captured the central tension in the case. In one frame, Rasmussen was a reckless teenager who treated a loaded pistol like a prop. In the other, he was a young defendant whose worst act happened before adulthood had fully settled into judgment and restraint. The judge’s sentence did not erase either frame, but it clearly favored accountability over leniency. Ten to 16 years means the court did not treat Riley’s death as a mistake that could be answered with a brief term or probation-style supervision. Even though the charge was involuntary manslaughter rather than murder, the sentence reflected the court’s conclusion that the underlying conduct carried grave blame. That distinction matters. Involuntary manslaughter can sound lesser in ordinary conversation, but when the conduct involves reckless weapon handling that kills a teenager, the punishment can still be measured in a decade or more.
Riley’s family gave the hearing its emotional center. His father, Jacob Sears, described the call that told him his son had been shot. Public reporting did not reduce Riley to a case number or a forensic detail. He remained a teenager whose death came in a home, among people he knew, during what should have been a safe night indoors. That setting strengthened the prosecution’s theme that the case was not about bad luck striking at random. It was about choices that made the risk obvious before the trigger was ever pulled. The judge’s task was to sentence Rasmussen, not to explain away the entire culture of teen access to guns. Still, the case has drawn wider notice because it so clearly showed what can happen when familiar warnings are ignored in a familiar room.
The procedural road ahead is now short and narrow. Rasmussen has pleaded guilty, Johnson has imposed sentence, and the facts driving the conviction are largely set. Any future action would likely come through a standard appeal or later request related to the sentence. There is no jury verdict to revisit and no unresolved question about whether Rasmussen accepted criminal responsibility. The courtroom’s final major act was the sentencing itself, where the prosecution’s warning and the family’s loss met the judge’s obligation to decide what prison term the law required.
For now, the case stands as a blunt example of how quickly recklessness can move from horseplay to homicide. Riley Sears is dead, Rasmussen is headed to prison for at least 10 years, and the next milestone, if there is one, will come in legal filings rather than new testimony about what happened that night.
Author note: Last updated March 25, 2026.