11 officers on administrative leave after Paris chase, shooting
May 7—PARIS — Eleven law enforcement officers from five agencies are on administrative leave following an officer-involved shooting Monday in Paris, according to the Office of the Maine Attorney General.
They include Lt. Justin Brown and deputies William Nelson, Jeffrey Howe and Danielle Vienneau of the Oxford County Sheriff's Office; Sgt. Dan Hanson and Trooper Tyler Nadeau of Maine State Police; Detective Gary Hill and Cpl. Robert Federico of the Norway Police Department; Sgt. Allen Coffin of the Paris Police Department; and Chief Rickie Jack and Officer Michael Rioux of the Oxford Police Department.
Administrative leave is standard practice in any officer-involved shooting, according to the AG's Office.
The officers were responding to an incident Monday in which Gary Porter, 37, was eventually arrested after crashing two police vehicles on Route 117. He is charged with two counts of theft, assault on a police officer, escaping custody, eluding police and violation of bail. He is scheduled to make his first appearance in a South Paris court at 1 p.m. Wednesday.
According to officials, the incident started after Porter was arrested Monday morning on a warrant charging felony theft. He was initially taken to Stephens Memorial Hospital in Norway due to unrelated health conditions.
Paris police Chief Michael Dailey drove Porter from the hospital to the Oxford County Jail in Paris, according to Shannon Moss, spokesperson for the Maine Department of Public Safety. As Dailey was attempting to remove Porter — handcuffed and wearing a hospital gown — from the vehicle, Porter somehow slipped his cuffed hands from behind his back to his front, jumped into the driver's seat of Dailey's police vehicle and drove away. Dailey was thrown from the moving vehicle while attempting to stop Porter, she said.
Officers from Norway, Oxford and Paris, Cumberland and Oxford County sheriffs' deputies, state police and state fire marshals pursued Porter, along Route 117 where he crashed the chief's vehicle into a ditch, Moss said. "Officers confronted Porter and gunfire was exchanged. Porter was struck but fled and stole an Oxford County Sheriff's vehicle, which he crashed a short distance up the road."
He was eventually taken into custody, treated and released from a local hospital and taken to the jail, Moss said.
According to records obtained from the Maine State Bureau of Identification, in 2011 Porter was charged with misdemeanor assault and disorderly conduct by state police in Houlton, with another three charges of assault stemming from the same incident in January that year added by the Aroostook County district attorney.
Porter was later found guilty of two counts of assault and one of criminal threatening. The disorderly conduct and the third assault charge were dismissed. He was sentenced to serve 11 months, with all but 30 days suspended, and fined $300.
In September 2023 in Norway, Porter was charged with felony theft by unauthorized taking or transfer and misdemeanor theft by unauthorized use of property. He was indicted on both charges April 11. That case is pending.
According to court records, Porter listed his home address as Ash Way in Paris as recently as April 11, and has previously lived in Woodland.
His driver's license was suspended in 2020 after he was twice charged with failing to produce evidence of insurance and then failed to pay a fine on one of those charges.
In August 2022, Porter was slightly injured when he drove off Park Street at the intersection of Jackson Crossing Road in Paris in a pickup truck. According to the accident report, the road where he crashed was clear and dry and he told the responding officer he felt tired and dizzy just before the crash. He was not wearing a seat belt and sustained cuts to his head and face.
Porter was living in Bryant Pond village in Woodstock at the time; the truck was owned by a woman who also lived in Bryant Pond.
As a result of that crash, he was charged with operating after suspension. His license expired in October 2022, according to the Bureau of Motor Vehicles.
A witness to Monday's confrontation said she came upon the gunfire while heading to Wilton.
Linda Mercer said she saw two police cruisers blocking the road and several others ahead near a truck in the ditch.
"It sounded like he was firing at the police, and they returned fire while he was still in the ditch in the truck," Mercer said, who was filming it with her cellphone.
"After things quieted down, he started moving around again and they shouted for him to come out," she said.
"He kind of walked slowly to the back of the truck like he was going to come around and give up," she said. "Then he took off running. You could see his hands bound."
Handcuffed and still wearing a hospital gown, Porter jumped into another police vehicle, she said, adding she thought he fired two shots at police who immediately returned fire as he drove away.
She said she never felt she was in danger until Porter raced to the second vehicle and exchanged shots with police. At that point she hid behind her vehicle, while still filming the scene.
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