Worker at Michael Bloomberg’s ranch is kidnapped at gunpoint, feds say. Man sentenced

A 51-year-old Colorado man is going to prison after he was convicted of kidnapping a woman and holding her at gunpoint, federal officials said.

In February 2022, Joseph Beecher was working in an apartment complex in Craig, Colorado, when he was told by his employer “that his services were no longer needed,” according to a Dec. 6 news release by the U.S. Attorney’s Office District of Wyoming.

That’s when Beecher broke into his employer’s home and stole two guns, officials said.

Then he drove to a ranch owned by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg with the intention of killing him, prosecutors said. The ranch is about 50 miles away near Meeker, according to CBS News. Bloomberg had purchased the property two years earlier, the news outlet reported.

When Beecher couldn’t find Bloomberg, he took a woman working at the ranch hostage and forced her to drive him to different locations while at gunpoint with the intention of killing another “media mogul,” prosecutors said.

Beecher then had the woman drive him to a Stage Coach Motel in Cheyenne, Wyoming, prosecutors said. Cheyenne is about a 100-mile drive north from Denver and about a 210-mile drive northeast from Craig.

The woman was eventually rescued by SWAT officers with the Cheyenne Police Department and was not injured.

Beecher was indicted in March 2022 and pleaded not guilty, prosecutors said.

He was sentenced to 22 years in prison followed by five years of supervised release.

This story was originally published December 6, 2024 at 5:54 PM with the headline "Worker at Michael Bloomberg’s ranch is kidnapped at gunpoint, feds say. Man sentenced."