Cercy accuser files lawsuit

Joshua Wolfson, Casper Star-Tribune via Wyoming News Exchange
Posted 6/23/21

The woman who accused former Casper businessman Tony Cercy of sexually assaulting her in 2017 filed a federal lawsuit against him Tuesday alleging assault and battery.

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Cercy accuser files lawsuit

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CASPER – The woman who accused former Casper businessman Tony Cercy of sexually assaulting her in 2017 filed a federal lawsuit against him Tuesday alleging assault and battery. 

The suit, which was filed in U.S. District Court for Wyoming, contains similar allegations to what the woman testified to at Cercy’s two criminal trials. She accuses Cercy of sexually assaulting her at his Alcova lake house in June 2017 while she was unconscious. 

Cercy was tried twice on the allegations. 

In February 2018, a Natrona County jury partially acquitted him, but could not agree on one count. That count was retried that fall in Hot Springs County, where the case had been moved due to pre-trial publicity. 

The second trial resulted in a conviction of the then 57-year-old Cercy. He was jailed the same day. 

In late December 2019, the Wyoming Supreme Court overturned Cercy’s conviction, concluding that the jury at his second trial was not properly instructed on state law governing the charge. 

Prosecutors declined to charge Cercy a third time. 

According to the federal lawsuit, Cercy now lives in Texas. His accuser, who was 20 at the time of the allegations, now lives in South Carolina. 

The suit accuses Cercy of performing oral sex on the woman while she was helpless and unconscious on a couch. It further alleges that Cercy refused to let her leave his lake house alone and threatened to have her killed if she told anyone about the alleged assault. 

Cercy has maintained his innocence through the investigation and trials. 

He testified at his first  trial that he didn’t have sexual contact with the woman. He did not take the stand at his second trial. 

A message left for the woman’s civil lawyer Marci Crank Bramlet on Tuesday was not immediately returned. Nor was a message left for Cercy’s trial attorney, the now retired Pamela Mackey. 

Cercy’s accuser had visited Alcova Reservoir on June 25, 2017. She spent the day boating and relaxing. 

At about 10 p.m., she and friends went to Cercy’s lake house. There was a party happening at the time, and the woman was, the suit says, very intoxicated. She fell asleep on the couch shortly after arriving. 

The lawsuit states the woman woke to find her clothes had been removed and Cercy sexually assaulting her on the couch sometime early the next morning. She pushed him away, according to the suit, and contacted friends for help. 

Cercy, the suit claims, tried to convince her to stay. The woman left on foot and said Cercy pulled up alongside her in a side-by-side recreational vehicle and told her to get in. He drove her to a trailer belonging to one of her friends in a reckless and dangerous manner, the lawsuit states, before dropping her off a few trailers away. 

It was then, according to the suit, that the woman says Cercy threatened to have her killed if she told anyone. 

At his first trial, Cercy said he was asleep at the time of the alleged assault. He said he did not wake until 8 a.m. By then, he told jurors, the woman was gone. 

During the criminal case, Mackey insinuated the woman was making the allegations for financial gain, noting paperwork received by Cercy’s lawyer from a civil attorney for the woman’s family.