LEWISTON, Maine — A local police officer has been charged with domestic violence assault and criminal threatening, Lt. Michael McGonagle said.
Timothy Darnell, 47, was first arrested Sunday morning in Portland and charged in connection with an incident that happened on Free Street in Portland at 12:16 a.m., McGonagle said.
Darnell was taken to Cumberland County Jail where he was released on bail.
He was arrested again on a warrant in Auburn on Thursday morning. He turned himself in at Androscoggin County Jail, a jail administrator said. Darnell was charged with violation of bail conditions in another incident at 4 p.m. Sunday in Lewiston. He posted $2,000 cash bail at Androscoggin County Jail on Thursday morning and was released.
Darnell had already surrendered his police badge and gun and had been placed on administrative leave before the weekend incidents, McGonagle said. Darnell is currently on unpaid administrative leave.
According to court documents, domestic problems between Darnell and his girlfriend date back at least to the summer of 2011 when Maine State Police responded to a report of a loud fight between the pair at a bed and breakfast in East Boothbay.
An internal affairs investigation into the recent matters is ongoing, McGonagle said.
An earlier protection from abuse order filed by Lorrie Champagne, 40, of Lewiston was dismissed by her. She filed for a new order for protection from abuse on Tuesday. A judge signed a temporary order, which remains in effect. A hearing is set for May 25 at 8th District Court in Lewiston.
In her complaint, Champagne wrote that Darnell “assaulted me the evening of [Saturday, May 5] in Portland.” She said he was arrested for “grabbing me by the throat and shoving my head into a glass window.” After he was released from jail later on Sunday, Darnell drove to her home to get his car, she wrote.
Darnell has been with the Lewiston Police Department since 1994. He has served as a Drug Abuse Resistance Education officer, working with elementary schoolchildren. He was also a school resource officer and a Gang Resistance Education and Training instructor for Lewiston Middle School.
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How many times does he have to grab her before she ENDS it all and NEVER gets involved with him again. If he has been arrested, then she should be in counseling for domestic abuse!!! End these crazy cycles of abuse. I know I don’t understand all of it, never lived it.
I hope he gets help.
To ‘protect and serve’……….right……
To protect and serve unless you are family or girlfriends.
Police departments are no place for cowardly bullies who manhandle those who are supposedly special in their life.
He should be fired with no pension and lose his right to carry a weapon.
This woman needs to get the message that this relationship is over.
yeah this guys a real winner and is defiantly someone who should be carrying a weapon and put in situations that are life or death…..NOT …..oh yeah im bringing back the 80s