Left: Angela Mittlestadt (Laramie County Sheriff’s Office). Center: Laramie County Fire District Chief Darrick Mittlestadt (Laramie County). Right: Darrick Mittlestadt (LCSO).
A Wyoming fire chief starved his 13-year-old adopted son, causing him to be “wafer thin” and “severely malnourished” to the point where he weighed 54 pounds and looked like a “concentration camp survivor,” according to a doctor who testified this week during the dad’s trial.
A child abuse physician who examined the severely underweight boy took the stand Tuesday on the first day of Darrick Mittlestadt’s trial and described the condition the child was in after being hospitalized in June 2025.
“No muscle to the bone,” said Dr. Andy Sirotnak, according to Cowboy State Daily.
Sirotnak testified that when the victim was admitted, he was diagnosed with cachexia, a complex metabolic syndrome characterized by progressive involuntary loss of body mass, including skeletal muscle and fat. He said the teen resembled a “concentration camp survivor” and “looked extremely ill,” Cowboy State Daily reported.
“Common sense would tell you that if you saw a child or patient who looked like this, they needed care,” Sirotnak testified.
Mittlestadt, who was the chief of Laramie County Fire District No. 1, and his wife, Angela Mittlestadt, were both charged with aggravated child abuse and conspiracy for the alleged mistreatment of the 13-year-old boy.
Angela Mittlestadt, 49, pleaded guilty to aggravated child abuse in a deal that is expected to lead to a 15- to 17-year prison sentence. She was facing up to 25 years.
According to Cowboy State Daily, Angela Mittlestadt is expected to testify during her husband’s trial.
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The Laramie County Sheriff’s Office told Law&Crime last year that the Mittlestadts took in the victim six years ago.
“F—ed up kid with trauma,” Angela Mittlestadt allegedly told an investigator. “I’m an idiot and thought I could help him,” she said, according to LCSO officials.
The pair’s arrest affidavit, which was obtained by the Cowboy State Daily and Wyoming News Now, accused them of starving the 13-year-old because of the way that he “behaved.” The boy reportedly told investigators that he was given crackers and protein shakes as a reward, and that his bedroom door was blockaded for roughly two years.
“I’m only allowed to eat one meal a day since there’s no point in giving me food,” the teen reportedly told a police officer, per the affidavit.
His ribs, collarbones and “other bones and joints” were allegedly “protruding and clearly visible on him due to how thin he was,” the document alleged. He was also missing “much of the hair on his head.”
Angela Mittlestadt told investigators that Darrick Mittlestadt often works and it was “overwhelming” for her to deal with the 13-year-old and another younger child that was in the home, according to police officials. Authorities say Darrick Mittlestadt accepted much of the responsibility for the boy’s condition during his police interviews.
“I failed everyone, because I didn’t do my job,” Darrick Mittlestadt allegedly said.
In June 2025, Angela Mittlestadt dropped the teen off at a Youth Development Center in Douglas and ordered him to tell a rep there that he “needed somewhere to live,” according to the affidavit. Asked why she would do that, the boy told the interviewer he “wasn’t very nice and did stuff he shouldn’t have done such as wetting the bed and picking at himself.”
The boy, who is originally from Colorado, was taken to the Colorado Children’s Hospital for medical treatment on June 24, 2025, weighing just 54 pounds, police said. The malnourishment was not recent and was accompanied by arrested bone growth and joint development, according to pediatricians who treated the child.
According to local radio station KGAB, the victim testified Tuesday and told the court he was kept in a bedroom all day, where he lived in total darkness.
“I didn’t think I was supposed to turn it on,” he said about the light fixture on the ceiling.
The boy told the court he was fed “one to three times a day,” according to KGAB, “sometimes peanut butter sandwiches or PB&J sandwiches.” Other times, he said he had ham sandwiches or “what they ate,” KGAB reports.
The Laramie County Fire District No. 1 has not responded to Law&Crime’s requests for comment.
The post Little boy who wouldn’t stop ‘picking at himself’ was starved by fire chief and wife until he resembled ‘concentration camp survivor’: Doctor first appeared on Law & Crime.
