BELGRADE — One man was killed and another person was injured during a police officer-involved shooting on Oakland Road in Belgrade Friday night, Kennebec County Sheriff Ken Mason said.
No police or neighbors were injured in the shooting, which occurred at a mobile home and involved an hours-long standoff with police lasting into the early morning hours. A criminal investigation is ongoing, Mason said at the scene Saturday morning.
During the morning interview, Mason declined to provide any information about the man who was killed and the person who was injured Friday. Later in the day, he did not immediately respond to requests for more information.
The shooting happened at a mobile home at 1003 Oakland Road, near the Oakland town line, and was reported around 9:30 p.m. Oakland Road is also known at Route 11 in that area.
Many officers responded to the scene, including those from the sheriff’s office and Maine State Police, and there were police scanner reports of someone inside the home yelling threats at police and shots fired inside and outside.
Meanwhile, police and local fire departments helped block off the road until early Saturday, Mason said.
John Short, a neighbor who lives across the street from the mobile home, said he heard gunfire after two men, who seemed intoxicated, had been spending time in the driveway of the home.
Before the gunfire, the younger of the two men was operating a red Ford Mustang sports car in the driveway, said Short.
The man was spinning the tires on the car, doing burnouts and at one point crashed it into the mobile home, Short said. The car appeared to be wedged underneath the home before he backed it out. Throughout that time, the younger man also hollered things and walked out into the street.
“He seemed upset,” Short said. “The guy was being belligerent. He was hollering something.”
The older man, on the other hand, “didn’t seem too agitated,” Short said.
Short didn’t know the names of either man, but said he thought the older one owned the property and the younger one was visiting. Short also says a woman who uses a wheel chair lives in the home, but police were not able to provide information about a third person Saturday morning.
According to Belgrade property tax records, 1003 Oakland Road is owned by Roger Bubar and Jenny Shorey.
Josh Worcester lives next door to 1003 Oakland Road, but said he can’t see the mobile home there because it’s separated by trees and a hill. He also wasn’t sure of the name of the people involved in the standoff Friday night.
In an email, Worcester said that he thinks two men got into an argument before the gunfire started, and that they are relatives of each other. Their argument “was getting very rowdy” by 9:30 p.m., Worcester said, so he called police to report a domestic argument.
After that, both Short and Worcester said they began to hear gunfire. When police arrived at the scene, they advised Short, his wife and their grandson to take cover in his basement, he said.
The gunfire was intermittent, but around 11 p.m., Worcester said he heard a burst of shots, followed by another burst 15 minutes later. He also heard yelling throughout that time. By 11:30 p.m., the gun shots seemed to have ended.
On Saturday, Short pointed out the red Mustang that the younger man had been driving the night before. It was parked to the one side of the driveway, as detectives, deputies and investigators from the Maine State Police analyzed the crime scene.
Because an officer was involved in the shooting, the Maine Attorney General’s office will be investigating it, Mason said.
No members of the public are at risk Saturday, Mason said.
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