BANGOR, Maine — A jury on Friday found a Mattawamkeag woman accused of breaking into her ex-lover’s home last year, stealing a vacuum cleaner and threatening him with a handgun not guilty of robbery, burglary, theft and criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon.
Kristine L. Neil, 48, was found guilty of criminal trespassing and operating under the influence of intoxicants, both misdemeanors, according to her attorney, Logan Perkins of Bangor.
The Bangor Daily News is not identifying the victim.
Neil was sentenced to five days at the Penobscot County Jail on the trespass charge and 48 hours in jail on the OUI, to be served concurrently. She began serving her sentence Saturday morning, according to jail personnel.
Neil, who has no prior criminal history, had been free on $7,500 bail before her trial began Wednesday, her attorney said Friday.
The jury of six men and six women deliberated for nearly four hours at the Penobscot Judicial Center before announcing their verdict.
“We are pleased with the verdict and appreciate [jurors’] conscientious deliberations and service,” Perkins said “My client is eager to put this whole ordeal behind her.”
Penobscot County District Attorney R. Christopher Almy, who prosecuted the case, said he was disappointed by, but respected, the jury’s decision.
“We’re concerned that she was not convicted of a felony when she said she went to his house to commit one,” he said. “She is still able to possess a gun. That’s disconcerting.”
Neil told a neighbor when she arrived at the victim’s home in Chester on Sept. 24, 2015, “I’m here to commit a felony,” Almy told the jury in his closing argument. She also put a blanket over her car to hide it and wore camouflage clothing, he said.
“During the burglary, [the victim] comes home and catches her right in the act,” Almy said. “She pulls out a gun, puts it in his face and starts to pull the trigger. He could see the whiteness on her knuckle. He was able to knock it out of her hand.”
Defense attorney Perkins told jurors in her closing argument that Neil went to the home of her former lover and ex-employer to retrieve the Electrolux vacuum cleaner that she purchased and used for her home cleaning business despite the fact that Neil had been served with a criminal trespass warning.
“You can’t steal what’s yours,” she said. “This is a nice vacuum cleaner and she wanted it back.”
Perkins successfully argued that Neil could not be convicted of theft because she genuinely believed the vacuum was hers.
“If she didn’t commit theft, she didn’t commit robbery or burglary,” the attorney told jurors.
After Neil confronted the victim, he called 911 and Neil drove away, according to Almy. She was stopped for driving erratically. Marijuana and a drug used to treat anxiety, for which Neil has a prescription, were found in her system, resulting in the OUI charge.
If convicted of the most serious charge, robbery, Neil faced a minimum of four years in prison because she was accused of pointing the gun at her victim. The maximum penalty for the crime is 30 years.
BDN writer Nok-Noi Ricker contributed to this report.