GRAND MEADOW – James Robert Eagan, 25, 108 North Main Street, Grand Meadow, remains hospitalized after a domestic dispute required the intervention of the Special Incident Response Team and other peace officers.

Thursday, August 19, 1999

GRAND MEADOW – James Robert Eagan, 25, 108 North Main Street, Grand Meadow, remains hospitalized after a domestic dispute required the intervention of the Special Incident Response Team and other peace officers.

According to Terese Amazi, chief deputy for the Mower County Sheriff’s Department, Mary Jo Eagan called the emergency 911 number at 11:45 a.m. Wednesday from a pay telephone near the Grand Meadow Medical Clinic.

She told a dispatcher her husband had threatened her, during a verbal argument and also threatened to harm himself.

The woman said her husband had a .44 caliber handgun and two knives in his possession.

The SIRT team, comprised of MCSD deputies and Austin Police Department officers, was preparing for an exercise, but was called into action for the Grand Meadow incident.

The presence of weapons and Eagan’s size, 6-foot-8 and 300 pounds, were mitigating factors in asking for assistance. Also helping were officers of the Minnesota State Patrol.

Amazi ordered evacuation of the building where the Eagans lived and nearby residences and positioned the officers around the residence, a two-story home converted to apartments near Grand Meadow’s downtown business district and issued three commands for Eagan to come out of the residence.

When he refused, a distractionary device similar to a concussion grenade was tossed into the apartment. Officers then broke down the front door to the apartment and found Eagan in a bathroom.

He was subdued with mace and handcuffed and taken away to St. Mary’s Hospital at Rochester by a Mayo One air ambulance.

According to Amazi, he suffered two superficial, self-inflicted knife wounds to the throat area. Eagan’s wife told officers her husband may have been high on methamphetamines, too.

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The revolver was found loaded in a bedroom.

No children were present and the wife escaped injury, according to reports.

After reports of the Wednesday incident are completed, they will be turned over to Mower County Attorney Patrick A. Oman to determine what charges will be filed.

"There were no injuries to officers and no injuries to citizens. The only injury was the self-inflicted wounds by Mr. Eagan. I would say the response went very well," Amazi said.

"We will evaluate our response at a later date and critique how we performed," Amazi said. "Always a real life experience is better than any training exercise; especially when there is a successful outcome as we had Wednesday in Grand Meadow."