Baraboo Man Sentenced to 6 Years for Methamphetamine Trafficking

MADISON, WIS. – Timothy M. O’Shea, United States Attorney for the Western District of Wisconsin, announced that Paul R. Ripp, 50, of Baraboo, Wisconsin was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge William M. Conley to 6 years in prison for possessing more than 50 grams of methamphetamine with the intent to distribute it.  Ripp pleaded guilty to this charge on December 8, 2022.

On March 28, 2022, Columbia County Sheriff’s deputies attempted to stop Ripp driving a truck near a hotel in Portage off the interstate highway, pursuant to an arrest warrant for state offenses.  Ripp fled from officers in a high-speed chase that reached speeds of 100 miles per hour.  Ripp avoided apprehension, then abandoned his truck and fled on foot.  The following day, Sauk County Sheriff’s deputies located Ripp at a hotel in Wisconsin Dells.  At the time Ripp was encountered and arrested by deputies outside the hotel, he was carrying a bag that contained multiple individually packaged bags of methamphetamine that totaled 111 grams of the drug.  In the months prior to his arrest, Ripp was involved in multiple sales of methamphetamine in both Columbia and Sauk Counties. 

Judge Conley said that a significant period of incarceration was necessary because Ripp had been trafficking methamphetamine in the community for an extended period of time and, further, endangered both officers and the public by engaging in high-speed flight when police attempted to apprehend him. Judge Conley also considered the fact that Ripp had been convicted of drug trafficking in recent years with little deterrence from sentences that had not imposed meaningful terms of incarceration.

The charge against Paul Ripp was the result of an investigation conducted by the Sauk and Columbia County Sheriffs’ Offices.  Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert A. Anderson prosecuted this case.