A Sauk County Circuit Court judge recently issued an arrest warrant for a former Baraboo man accused of brutalizing and stalking another person for years.
Wendell D. Gist, 48, of Country Club Hills, Illinois, faces three felony counts of first-degree sexual assault by use of a dangerous weapon, a felony charge of first-degree sexual assault causing great bodily harm and stalking with a result of bodily harm.
The charges stem from complaints made by the person who Gist allegedly attacked to a Sauk County Sheriff’s Office detective in early 2020. The person tried to explain that by working with a rape crisis counselor, they had decided to report the attacks. During the attempted interview, the person was distraught. The detective advised that they write down a record. In April 2021, a letter from the reporting person arrived.
According to the complaint, the letter detailed three separate attacks, two at a home on Quarry Street in Baraboo and another at Campus Inn in West Baraboo. A later attack also reportedly happened at another residence on Oak Street in Baraboo.
In one attack, Gist entered the home without the person’s knowledge and attacked them. The complainant told police that Gist forced them to a bedroom and laid them out on plastic wrap, threatening them with a knife and stabbing the person in the leg before sexually assaulting them while holding a gun to their head.
“I know a lot of this is hard to read,” says the letter. “I tried to go back and reread/write. I cannot….I’ve spent my adulthood traumatized. I live in fear.”
Gist also attacked the person in a separate encounter by using a hair straightener to burn the person’s arms, causing infection. During the attack at Campus Inn, the person told police Gist strangled and sexually assaulted them in a room there.
Gist also burned them with cigarettes. This person told police that as a result of Gist’s alleged attacks, they now deal with post traumatic stress disorder, paranoia, night terrors and depression.
These events happened roughly a decade ago, in 2011 and 2012, before this person moved away, though Gist has continued trying to contact them through social media.
Gist’s arrests over the years meant that the alleged harassment and abuse would be sporadic. According to court records, Gist was charged in September 2011 with substantial battery in Sauk County Circuit Court. He spent 90 days in jail as a condition of probation ordered by Circuit Court Judge Guy Reynolds, but it was revoked in February 2014 and he was sentenced to another 12 months in jail with work release privileges.
Gist has also been convicted of felony child abuse, carrying a concealed weapon, possessing up to 40 grams of cocaine with the intention to sell, strangulation and suffocation and misdemeanor battery.
According to messages provided in the complaint, Gist contacted the person he allegedly attacked in separate incidents in 2017, 2018 and 2021. He said he had “grown up” and apologized.
Circuit Court Judge Patricia Barrett issued the warrant Jan. 12. Gist faces a maximum of 167.5 years imprisonment and up to 85 years of extended supervision if convicted.
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