PRESQUE ISLE, Maine — The case of a 34-year-old Sanford man who was convicted of drug crimes in an Aroostook County courtroom last year was just one of the appeals heard by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court when the justices visited Presque Isle High School on Tuesday.
The Law Court — in Aroostook County as part of its annual road trip to high schools — heard oral arguments in three cases.
One of the cases involved Michael O. Fox, who was convicted of aggravated trafficking in scheduled drugs and violation of conditions of release in June 2013. He was sentenced to 14 years in prison with all but nine years suspended.
Fox was represented on appeal by Hunter Tzovarras of Bangor, who argued that the state’s evidence was insufficient to support a conviction because there was no proof he possessed all of the ingredients necessary to manufacture methamphetamine.
The state was represented Tuesday by Aroostook County Assistant District Attorney Kurt Kafferlin of Houlton.
The case against Fox began as he was traveling north on U.S. Route 1 in Bridgewater on Nov. 22, 2011. Chief Deputy Craig Clossey of the Aroostook County Sheriff’s Department intervened when he saw Fox assaulting a woman in a car on the side of the road, according to court records. Fox was arrested on an outstanding warrant and also charged with domestic violence assault.
During the stop, Clossey discovered several items in the vehicle that are used to manufacture methamphetamines, including tubing, drain cleaner and acetone, according to court documents. He contacted the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency for assistance and agents agreed that they likely had been used to make the drug. Agents confronted Fox at the Aroostook County Jail, but he said he was not involved in such activity.
Supervisory Special Agent Shawn Gillen investigated further and acquired recordings of phone calls that Fox placed to his wife from the jail, according to court documents. In the recordings, Fox expressed fear that agents would search a shed at his mother’s home and at one point specifically mentioned “meth.”
Agents subsequently went to Fox’s mother’s home in Presque Isle and asked permission to look in the shed. Agents found sodium hydroxide, starter fluid, two funnels, acetone, sulfuric acid, a green glass jug and more, which Gillen indicated in his report were items commonly used in the “one pot” method of manufacturing methamphetamine. Testing showed that methamphetamine residue was present on the blue funnel and some of the tubing found in the shed, according to court documents.
Recordings from the jail also revealed that when Fox’s wife told him that the MDEA had searched his mother’s shed and found some items, he cursed and “was otherwise unable to speak intelligibly for nearly a minute after he received this news,” according to court documents.
Tzovarras told the Law Court on Tuesday that the evidence showed Fox never had all the ingredients to manufacture methamphetamine and no methamphetamine was found in his possession. He also argued that the trial court gave the jury an incorrect definition of “manufacture” under the drug trafficking statute.
Kafferlin argued that the state had proper lab analysis to link the confiscated items to methamphetamine manufacturing as well as statements from witnesses who had purchased pseudoephedrine for Fox to use in the manufacturing process.
After the case adjourned, students in the audience were given a few minutes to ask questions about the case that were answered by the appeal attorneys and lawyer Frank Bemis of Presque Isle, who moderated the session.
There is no timetable under which the justices must issue their decisions.