One of several young people fleeing the bust of a late-night underage drinking party in western Minnesota was found nearby a half-day later and brought to a hospital by ambulance, but the effort was too late to save the star high school football player's life.
Michael C. Anyasike, 18, of Dawson, Minn., was identified by the Dawson-Boyd School District as the man who died Sunday.
"We're anticipating the school district will host the service," District Superintendent Brad Madsen said. "It will be very big, a very big event."
Anyasike "was very well known and very well liked," Madsen said of the senior, who was planning to attend St. John's University next fall. "You saw him everywhere. He always had a smile on his face and to adults was very respectful."
Anyasike was unaccounted for after the Lac qui Parle County Sheriff's Office arrived at the party early Sunday just outside of Madison. What led to his death has not been disclosed.
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When deputies arrived at the party shortly before 12:30 a.m., there were about 20 vehicles parked outside the farm site, the Sheriff's Office said.
Moments later, Anyasike and others at the property ran, the Sheriff's Office added.
Nearly 12 hours later, the Sheriff's Office received word that Anyasike was missing. The search by emergency personnel of "the surrounding area and farm sites" led to his discovery, a Sheriff's Office statement read. Anyasike was taken to Madison Hospital and pronounced dead.
Sheriff Rick Halvorson said there have been no arrests "as of yet" and declined to disclose the party's location. Halvorson, after consulting with the county attorney's office, said other details about the gathering and Anyasike's death were being withheld for now as well.
The veteran law enforcer said he's at a loss to express his reaction to the death of yet another young person to a situation involving underage drinking.
"I don't even know how to answer that," he said. "It's a frustrating fact of growing up."
Superintendent Madsen said "everybody has a whole lot of questions about what happened. Nobody has answers right now."
A photo memorial on a hallway wall in the high school has been drawing students all morning, many signing their names and expressing their sorrow, Madsen said.
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"We are looking out for [troubled students] and tears today," the superintendent of the 525-student district said. Counselors from other communities have joined those on staff along with members of ministry to tend to students' needs.
The Dawson-Boyd football team made it to the Prep Bowl last fall, but lost to champion Mahnomen to round out a 12-2 season. Anyasike rushed for 1,260 yards and 14 touchdowns last season. He also was a track athlete at the school.
Blackjacks head football coach Cory Larson told the Marshall Independent newspaper that his go-to running back's "teammates have holes in their hearts that may never be healed. He left them with some good memories that, hopefully, they will be able to hang on to."
Anyasike's three younger siblings, two brothers and a sister, attend school in the same district. A prayer service for Anyasike was being arranged at Grace Lutheran Church in Dawson.
Authorities haven't said where the underage drinkers at the party got alcohol from, but the county has a social host law, which holds criminally responsible any adult who allows a group of people under 21 to drink alcohol on public or private property.
The passage of the ordinance in 2010 was spearheaded by Commissioner Terry Overlander, whose 18-year-old daughter Mackenzie died in 2003 when the car she was riding in from a party hosted by someone older crashed with a drunken driver behind the wheel.
Three years later, a 16-year-old girl in the Montevideo area died under similar circumstances, prompting Overlander to champion an ordinance that he said Monday "gives the Sheriff's Office and the county attorney something more to charge" older people who give underage drinkers a place to party.
Overlander, who has acknowledged his own difficulties with alcoholism, said his daughter was one of four kids in the vehicle. The others escaped with their lives, but Mackenzie's "leg was pinned, the car caught fire and it was the fire that killed her. ... I'm told time heals all wounds, but this is one wound that won't heal. It only lessens the pain."
