Police arrived at a downtown apartment on Valentine’s Day expecting a domestic dispute. What they found required the expertise of the bomb squad.
Jeffrey A. Wagner, 33, faces a felony count of possession of an incendiary device after police uncovered in his apartment a cache of powders, cardboard tubes and other materials allegedly used to make small explosives.
Paige Hogoboom, 28, frustrated with what she said Wagner was doing, alerted officers to the materials in her apartment, according to an affidavit from police seeking a search warrant.
She said that “while she was in the car with Jeff, he would toss out ‘bombs’ and they went ‘boom.’ They ‘went off fast,’ ” the affidavit says.
He would toss out the improvised explosive devices whether they were in the country or the city, Hogoboom told authorities.
“Based on the size of the device components, the explosive devices would be capable of causing property damage, serious bodily injury or death,” wrote Detective Joe Tennant, a 12-year veteran of the Denver Police Department’s bomb squad.
When police responded to the call about 1 a.m. at the apartments just off the 16th Street Mall at Glenarm Street, they found Wagner had a head wound.
He was taken to Denver Health Medical Center for treatment. With Hogoboom’s permission, officers searched the apartment and turned up two completed explosive devices, according to the search warrant, which was eventually issued for Wagner’s car. No explosives were found in the car.
A call to the apartment Monday was not answered.
Court records show that a prior misdemeanor charge against Wagner related to the unlawful use of fireworks was dismissed in Littleton in 1999.
Jessica Fender: 303-954-1244 or jfender@denverpost.com
