Standoff Ends With A Man In Custody

WEBSTER COUNTY, Miss. (WCBI) – It was a tense morning in Webster County on Tuesday.

An attempt to take a man in for a court ordered mental evaluation leads to a standoff with law enforcement.

The man barricaded himself inside a home near downtown Eupora.

He then armed himself with a gun inside the home, putting his mother and law enforcement in harm’s way.

It all happened here, at this home in Eupora, Tuesday morning.

Sherry Shurden says her 28-year-old son, Justin Shurden, is bipolar, psychotic, and schizophrenic and hasn’t been taking his medication.

“I went down there to meet with Rob Collins to have the papers made out and, you know, where they could pick him up and send him off to a hospital.”

Sherry and law enforcement say that’s what set her son off.

“He got my husband’s gun and put some bullets in it, and he come to the door, and told them that he was going to kill them.”

Chief Deputy Jeff Mann was en-route to the scene as everything was unfolding.

He says thinking about a gun going off is a nightmare.

“We were really on edge. Also, while on scene, he was throwing firecrackers out the back door of the home, and so you know, thank goodness everybody had their sense about them to know it wasn’t gunfire, and you know, that’s part of the training, we get to realize the fake and the real and in a situation like that not to over react.”

Investigator Landon Griffin says you can never have enough training in these types of situations.

“Memory muscle helps you out a lot in situations like that, but the overall training today was patience, having patience. We don’t want to rush in there, we don’t know the situation. We don’t know really what kind of state of mind he’s in.”

Law enforcement say teamwork, communication, and dispatch are crucial.

“Calling into MHP and making sure they know to call the SWAT and things like that, you know, we can’t do it by phones, so we have to relay all of that information through 911 or our dispatchers here at the sheriff’s department, so we rely on them heavily to make sure they’re getting that information to the proper authorities,” says Mann.

Mann says the Mississippi Highway Patrol and SWAT team were initially called in to assist, but before they arrived, Sheriff Tim Mitchell made entry into the house and the man was taken into custody.

The case remains under investigation and no injuries were reported.