PORTLAND – In a remote cabin at the end of a logging road outside Jackman, a group of police officers crept up to the house of Katherine Hegarty and burst through the door a decade ago.

Facing the barrel of a loaded rifle, they shot the 51-year-old woman dead.

The events leading to Hegarty’s death on May 16, 1992, sparked a wave of criticism and questions about police responses to standoff situations. A task force appointed by then-Attorney General Michael Carpenter examined Maine laws regarding police use of force.

The task force’s recommendations led to new laws that dramatically raised the minimum standards for law enforcement officers in Maine. Entrance requirements for police cadets were raised, training was expanded for all new officers, and new policies were established for local police dealing with high-risk situations.

Brian MacMaster, chief of investigations for the state Attorney General’s Office and chairman of the Criminal Justice Academy’s board of trustees, said one of the most significant changes precipitated by Hegarty’s shooting was not incorporated into any law or policy.

“There is probably a greater sense of accountability in law enforcement in terms of the actions and operations they undertake, a greater sense they’re going to be accountable to the public,” said MacMaster.

An investigation after Hegarty’s death cleared the officers of any criminal wrongdoing, but Carpenter was highly critical, declaring their tactics “ill-conceived, poorly planned and hastily executed.”

The whole incident involving Hegarty took about 11 minutes.

Hegarty was a veteran Maine Guide who had run hunting camps in areas surrounding Jackman near the Canadian border. The incident arose after a confrontation with some fishermen who camped near her property.

Hegarty, who appeared highly intoxicated at the time, fired shots over their heads and chased them away. The men notified police, and four Somerset County sheriff’s deputies and a state trooper came to the scene.

Hegarty refused to come out of her cabin as ordered and officers, believing that she had put down her gun, went to enter the cabin.

By the time the officers rammed the door open, Hegarty had retrieved her .22-caliber rifle. She aimed it toward the officers. A shotgun blast fired by one of the officers at the window killed her instantly.

The situation turned out to be vastly different from one on April 4 in the same part of the state, long after new policies and training standards had been adopted.

A drunken and despondent man locked himself in his Jackman house and refused to come out. Some of the best-armed and best-trained police in the state took position around his house and waited.

They negotiated, talked and waited patiently for six hours until the man finally came out voluntarily.