COLUMBUS, Ohio — An Old Orchard Beach man facing bigamy charges was arrested by the Franklin County, Ohio, Sheriff’s Office on Friday following a phone call providing  a location where the suspect was “from someone familiar with the situation.”

Michael Middleton, 43, whose last known address was Old Orchard Beach, is being held in the Franklin County jail in Columbus, Ohio, awaiting an extradition hearing scheduled for Friday, according to Sheriff’s Office spokesman Marc Gofstein. If the Franklin County court grants the extradition request, Middleton will be returned to Maine.

Middleton was apprehended on Friday, Gofstein said. “Our radio dispatch room received a phone call from someone familiar with the situation that (Middleton) was in our area,” he said. The caller told the dispatcher a few locations where Middleton could be. A lieutenant and sergeant from the Sheriff’s Office went to one of the locations “and he was arrested without incident,” Gofstein said.

A warrant for Middleton’s arrest was issued Thursday by a New Hampshire court after his missed his arraignment hearing that same day.

However, the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office is holding Middleton on a warrant issued by the state of Maine, where he was arrested for domestic violence in 2014.

Middleton was indicted by a New Hampshire grand jury last month on a bigamy charge. He’s accused of knowingly marrying a woman in New Hampshire while being married to women in Georgia and Alabama.

An indictment is not a finding of guilt, but a finding that enough evidence exists to move forward with prosecution.

Middleton was scheduled to appear for an arraignment at Strafford County Superior Court in Dover, New Hampshire, on Thursday. When he didn’t show up, the court issued a warrant for his arrest, according to the County Clerk’s Office.

According to a police investigation, Middleton was already married to Katherine Lashley of Georgia and Kassandra Shipley of Alabama when he married Alicia Grant of Dover, New Hampshire, in 2013. Investigators believe that there may be even more marriages in other locations not yet discovered.

Grant and Middleton moved to South Berwick in 2014 and Middleton was arrested for domestic violence there that same year.

Grant, who now lives in Exeter, New Hampshire, told WMTW-TV that Middleton made her feel like he cared about her. He eventually scammed her out of $20,000, according to The Associated Press.

Grant had no idea Middleton had other wives when she married him, according to the AP.

The three wives eventually found out about each other, and Grant has been trying to track down Middleton for years to have their marriage annulled, according to the AP.

In New Hampshire, bigamy is a Class B felony, with a penalty of 3 ½ to 7 years in prison. A person convicted of a Class B felony could also receive a fine of up to $4,000 and up to 5 years probation.

— Associate Editor Dina Mendros can be reached at 780-9014 or by email at dmendros@journaltribune.com. Staff Writer Liz Gotthelf and The Associated Press contributed to this article.

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