DEXTER, Maine — A slightly unscrewed light bulb helped police quietly capture a town man charged early Sunday with hitting an officer with an SUV and escaping during a brief chase down Main Street hill.
Joseph Collins, 37, was charged Sunday with reckless conduct with a dangerous weapon, a felony. He was being held on $1,000 cash bail at the Penobscot County Jail in Bangor late Sunday, a jail spokeswoman said. More charges are expected, police said.
Dexter police Sgt. Kevin Wintle said Collins and Officer Gary Morin are lucky that Morin didn’t get killed when the Mercury Mountaineer sideswiped him in a driveway at 84 Main St. late Saturday. Morin suffered a damaged rotator cuff in one of his shoulders. He was treated at Mayo Regional Hospital in Dover-Foxcroft early Sunday, and likely will be out of work for several days, Wintle said.
“He is very lucky. It is a very, very serious incident. The officer was almost run down,” Wintle said Sunday. “Morin managed to move out of the way. He was trying to get the vehicle to stop when, it is believed, the vehicle hit him. I think he handled it in a very professional manner. We are just fortunate there wasn’t a worse outcome.”
A handgun was fired during the incident. Investigators are working to determine who fired, though they believe they know, Wintle said.
The incident began at about 9:10 p.m. Saturday, when Morin was dispatched to 84 Main St. on a report of a possible violation of a protective order. Morin saw Collins, whom he recognized from previous encounters, near the dwelling. The two began speaking. The conversation was amiable until Collins suddenly broke away from Morin and got into the Mountaineer, Wintle said.
Morin was trying to stop Collins’ escape when the vehicle struck Morin a glancing blow and knocked him into a snowbank. Morin scrambled to his feet and into his cruiser and pursued, but Collins was gone, Wintle said.
Several state police, Penobscot and Somerset county sheriffs and town police began searching for Collins. State police made intermittent contact with him throughout the night through his cell phone as they tried unsuccessfully to find him and get him to surrender as town police started conducting surveillance on 84 Main St. at about 10 p.m., Wintle said.
“We were just trying to get a line on where he was,” Wintle said.
By midnight, they began to suspect that Collins had returned to the dwelling, and were considering calling in the state police tactical team, when a simple move officers made to see inside the house paid off. An officer had unscrewed the light bulb on the front porch enough to dim the bulb but not remove it. With its glare gone, they could see moving shadows inside that they took to be Collins, Wintle said.
Wintle telephoned Collins and convinced him to surrender at 3:30 a.m., Wintle said.
Collins is due to appear in Superior Court in Bangor on Monday afternoon, Wintle said.