A Roseau County man is in a psychiatric unit in Thief River Falls after being arrested for pulling a gun outside a bar in Roosevelt, Minn.
According to Lake of the Woods County Sheriff Dallas Block, Eugene Skoglund, 45, was drinking in the Nite Hawk Bar and Grill about midnight Saturday. When someone took away his car keys to keep him from driving after drinking, Skoglund drew a handgun and demanded his keys, got them and drove off, Block said.
A waitress at the Nite Hawk, which is in Roosevelt and Lake of the Woods County, next to the Roseau County line, said Skoglund had never been in the bar before.
But another waitress knew Skoglund was on medication and shouldn't be drinking, so she called his brother and sister, the waitress said. Although his sister tried to keep him from driving away, Skoglund brandished the handgun and drove off toward his home in rural Roseau, the waitress said.
No shots were fired and nobody was hurt.
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But Skoglund apparently decided to hide his handguns from expected law enforcement officers in a way he later could retrieve them, by placing them in rural mail boxes along his route back home, Block said.
Block said his deputies, after contacting Roseau County Sheriff's Office, went to Skoglund's home in rural Roseau and arrested him without incident within hours of the confrontation in Roosevelt.
Skoglund spent a night in jail in Lake of the Woods County, charged with second-degree assault with a firearm. He then was transferred to the psychiatric unit at a hospital in Thief River Falls, where he remains, Block said.
The Roseau County Sheriff's Office put out news releases asking residents to check their mail boxes to see if they contained guns. By Tuesday, two handguns were found in mailboxes, Block said.
No trial date has been set for Skoglund on the assault charge until a mental health evaluation is completed, Block said.
Reach Lee at (701) 780-1237; (800) 477-6572, ext. 237; or send e-mail to slee@gfherald.com
