Prosecutors are trying to send a Steuben man accused of killing another man’s dog back to jail for violating conditions from a previous terrorizing conviction.
Justin T. Chipman, 23, is facing charges of burglary, two counts of theft, aggravated criminal mischief and aggravated cruelty to animals in connection with the shooting death last summer of a dog named Franky that belonged to a Winter Harbor fisherman. Nathan Burke, 37, of Hancock, who worked as a sternman for the dog’s owner, also is accused in the alleged crime.
Chipman was convicted last January of three misdemeanor charges stemming from a 2016 incident in Gouldsboro in which he fired a gun at another man’s house and left a threatening note in the man’s car as part of a fishing dispute.
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He was still on administrative release from that conviction when Franky was shot and killed. If his administrative release is terminated, Chipman could go back to jail for three months before the dog shooting case is resolved, according to Hancock County District Attorney Matthew Foster.
Franky — a mix between a Boston terrier and a pug — went missing last August when his owner, Phil Torrey, was out of town. The dog’s body was found a few days later washed up on a beach in Winter Harbor by Foster’s wife. Foster has recused himself from prosecuting the case because his wife is a witness.
Chipman’s defense attorney, Robert Van Horn of Ellsworth, did not respond to messages seeking comment on Chipman’s case.
Chipman and Burke are accused of entering Torrey’s house, kidnapping Franky, taking Torrey’s Hummer for a joyride and then shooting the dog. Both men have told police Franky ran off during the joyride and they never saw him again.
Last January, Chipman was convicted on charges of terrorizing, shooting a firearm from a vehicle and burglary of a motor vehicle in connection with the November 2016 incident in Gouldsboro. Chipman was acquitted at the same trial of two felony counts of reckless conduct with a dangerous weapon. Because the charges he was convicted on all are misdemeanors, Chipman still is allowed to possess firearms, Foster said.
The overall sentence Chipman received a year ago was four months in jail with all but 10 days suspended, according to Foster. Chipman also was placed on 9 months of administrative release after he got out of jail — which was still in effect when Franky was killed.
Foster said Monday that Chipman was placed on administrative release last January, rather than probation, because the court did not see the need to require Chipman to stay away from certain activity — aside from criminal behavior — or to maintain regular contact with a probation officer.
“Administrative release is used when there would be no real benefit to probation, but we still want to have some way to monitor a defendant’s continued abstinence from committing crimes,” Foster said Monday in an email. “It is basically unsupervised probation.”
Foster’s office has filed a motion to terminate Chipman’s administrative release, which could result in him going back to jail for the unserved portion of the 4-month sentence he received for the terrorizing conviction, the prosecutor said. A hearing on the motion is scheduled for Hancock County Unified Criminal Court on Feb. 15.
Chipman was held in jail for nearly three weeks following his Sept.5 arrest on the charges related to Franky’s death, but was released later that month on $1,000 bail, according to the Ellsworth American.
