| EJF Home | Find Help | Help the EJF | Comments? | Get EJF newsletter | Newsletters |
| Domestic Violence Book | DV Site Map | DV bibliography | DV index |
| Chapter 9 — Domestic Violence Against Men In The United States |
| Next — Stories Of Abused Men In Maryland |
| Back — Stories Of Abused Men In Louisiana |
Stories here are reproduced under the Fair Use exception of 17 USC § 107 for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use.
Dixfield woman charged with trying to drown ex-husband
Both parties arrested after report of domestic disturbance
Winterport woman accused of hitting boyfriend with phone
Amy Dugas: Murder, multiple assaults on boyfriends, husbands, police officers, probation, which she violates
Boyfriend's dog found dead in Kittery
June 12, 2001 (AP) — A Dixfield woman has been charged with attempting to murder her former husband.
Celeste Wilson was released on her own recognizance Monday following an appearance in district court. She was not required to enter a plea.
According to police reports and affidavits, Celeste Wilson and Richard Wilson went paddle-boating on the Webb River on Saturday. They said an argument became heated.
Richard Wilson told police she told him he was "in a bad position, being on a river and not knowing how to swim." He said the argument became physical and his ex-wife pushed him into the river and held his head under water. He was able to break away and reach the shore.
Celeste Wilson told police she did try to hold his head under water to drown him but then blacked out. When she regained consciousness, she didn't remember anything and began to worry. She said she began to remember doing something wrong and feared she had hurt her ex-husband.
Reproduced under the Fair Use exception of 17 USC § 107 for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use.
July 7, 2001 —Orono police recently arrested a 54-year-old man and charged him with assaulting his wife, only to arrest the wife as well after she sought to prevent the arrest and struck a police officer, according to reports.
Stephan Manzo was charged with domestic assault while his wife, Brenda Manzo, 49, faces charges of assault and obstructing government administration.
Police were called to the couple's Broadway Street home early on the evening of June 30 for a report of a domestic assault and Brenda Manzo came to the door, the left side of her face swollen and cut, reported Officer Scott Wilcox.
Her husband, who had called police, told Wilcox that during an argument in the living room, she had pushed and hit him, although the only injury Wilcox could see was a small cut on the man's thumb. Wilcox heard a different story when he spoke to Mrs. Manzo, who reported her husband struck her on the side of the face with his hand.
Confronted about the discrepancies and his wife's injuries, Manzo told police that he may have struck her in the face while he was trying to push her away, Wilcox said.
Manzo cooperated with police as they arrested him and had him walk to their cruisers. His wife, however, became belligerent and, bypassing two officers, approached Wilcox. The officer said that Mrs. Manzo repeatedly refused to back away and struck him in the arm.
She struggled with the officers as they tried to arrest her, punching Wilcox in the leg and telling him that if he released her, she was going to kill him, the officer said. The police connected two sets of handcuffs and secured her arms behind her back and placed her in a cruiser.
Mrs. Manzo managed to tuck her legs through her handcuffed arms and pulled her arms in front of her. She then began pounding on the window, which could be heard down the street. Concerned she would shatter the window, the police handcuffed her again, this time with just one pair of handcuffs.
Officer Shane Butler reported that at the Penobscot County Jail, Mrs. Manzo continued to scream obscenities at Wilcox and said that Wilcox's body would be found at the bottom of the river.
by Walter Griffin, Of the NEWS Staff e-mail Walter
© 2003 Bangor Daily News
Reproduced under the Fair Use exception of 17 USC § 107 for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use.
December 10, 2003, Winterport —A local woman was arrested on a charge of assault after allegedly smacking her boyfriend on the side of the head with a telephone.Waldo County Deputy Ben Seekins arrested Carolyn Hathaway, 43, of Winterport about 8:30 a.m. Tuesday after being alerted to the attack by Winterport Ambulance personnel.
Seekins said the left side of the man's head was "split open" when the deputy arrived at the couple's home.
Seekins said the attack apparently stemmed from an ongoing argument between Hathaway and the alleged victim's 25-year-old son, who also lived at the home.
"She got angry about an incident that took place between her and [the alleged victim's] son the night before, and she picked up the phone and hit him on the left side of the head," Seekins said. "She really split his head open. Blood was just pouring all over the place."
Seekins said rescue personnel managed to stanch the bleeding, and the man received stitches at a hospital to close an approximately 1-inch gash on his head.
Seekins said Ms. Hathaway acknowledged consuming alcohol the night before and that she appeared to be under the influence when he placed her under arrest.
Carolyn Hathaway was booked at the Waldo County Jail, where bail was set at $50.
On February 26, 2004, Amy Dugas, age 35, kicked her then husband Mark in the eye with a boot at his friend's home in Jefferson. When the Lincoln County sheriff's deputy came to arrest her at their home in Waldoboro, she kicked the cop in the groin, damaged his cruiser, and refused to sign a summons. The judge at the time released her on bail, ordering her to refrain from using weapons. Four months later, on June 4, 2004, this mother of two stabbed her 39-year-old husband at the couple's home on Winslow Mills Road with a foot-long kitchen knife, fatally severing his pulmonary artery.
Amy Dugas was also charged with biting Maine State Police Trooper Jason Andrews on the finger the night of the stabbing.
She was originally charged with assault. A grand jury elevated the charge to murder, setting aside the lesser charge.
In April 2005, Dugas was found not guilty of all charges in connection with the June 2004 stabbing death of her husband, Mark Dugas. Dugas, who testified during the trial, stated she was acting in self-defense after her husband attacked her.
Since Amy Dugas had to be considered innocent until proven guilty, during the murder trial, the jury was not permitted to hear that she had been arrested for assaulting her husband and assaulting the police officer four months prior to the fatal stabbing.
Because a death was involved the state attorney general's office tried the Amy Dugas murder case. Jeff Rushlau was the local prosecuting attorney on the February 2004 domestic assault charge. Apparently, even if the domestic assault case had been tried first, it most likely would not have been included in the murder trial because Maine statutes are not set up that way. The only evidence that was allowed in the trial was what directly happened on the day Mark died. It is up to the judge to allow prior history but the only type of prior history that is presently allowed is in sexual assault cases. As as Carey Roberts notes, In Maine it doesn't pay to be a man and women are protected as best the redfem industry can manage.
Following her acquittal, as arranged, Dugas was slated to plead no contest to charges of assaulting her husband and kicking a Lincoln County sheriff's deputy in the groin as he tried to arrest her on the assault charge in the February 2004 incident, three months before stabbing Mark Dugas.
Instead, Ms. Dugas rejected the plea agreement and sought a jury trail. In September 2005, Dugas was convicted by a Cumberland County jury of the two assault charges. She was sentenced to 330 days in jail for the attack on her husband. Ms. Dugas was only required to serve 23 days in jail on that charge, since she had served 10 months awaiting trial on the murder charge.
She also was sentenced to two years, with all but 307 days suspended, for kicking a Lincoln County sheriff's deputy in the groin as he tried to arrest her on the assault charge. In addition, Dugas received a concurrent 15-day sentence for criminal mischief for damaging the cruiser's window and a concurrent 10-day sentence for refusing to sign a summons. She was also sentenced to serve two years of probation.
After she was released from jail, Amy Dugas was allowed to move to Tennessee through the interstate compact apparently to live with relatives. It is common practice and allows a person to serve their probation in another state.
After moving to Rockvale, Tennessee, she changed her name from Dugas to Bowen, which may be her maiden name.
In late 2006 she was charged in Tennessee with domestic assault on a new boyfriend, William Dimler. Apparently unaware of her convictions and probation status in Maine, she was given a "retired," or deferred sentence with one year probation in Tennessee.
Not one to stay alone, or out of trouble, in early 2007 Amy, now 38, married Brian Pelletier, a former Wiscasset County jail corrections officer. Three weeks later, in March 2007 she was arrested for assaulting her new husband in their home in Rockvale, Tennessee.
That arrest led to her being extradited to Maine for parole violation and on August 14, 2007 Amy Dugas Bowen Pelletier admitted in the Lincoln County Supreme Court in Maine to assaulting her then new husband in their home in Rockvale, Tennessee. She was then sentenced to serving the remaining 125 days of her probation in jail.
© 2004 by Shir Haberman, Portsmouth Herald
Reproduced under the Fair Use exception of 17 USC § 107 for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use.
Monday, May 24, 2004 — Police allege that a Portsmouth woman, not willing to let a dog come between her and her man, thought she had found a way to solve the problem. She and a friend faked a burglary and killed the canine, officers charge.
On Friday, May 21, at approximately 10 PM, Kittery police arrested two women and charged them with receiving stolen property. The charges stemmed from the report of a burglary by an Eliot resident, who said a computer, camera and his 2-year-old dachshund dog Dewey had been stolen from his residence.
Shannon Walters, 34, of 5 Nicholes Ave., Newmarket, New Hampshire, and Erin M. Wylie, 27, of 50 Harvard St., Portsmouth, New Hampshire, were arrested in the parking lot of the Dairy Queen at the Kittery circle. Police allege the women met there to discuss how to dispose of the remains of the dog.
Ms. Walters reportedly told police that Erin Wylie was the victim's girlfriend and apparently did not like the dog. Walters allegedly said the burglary was staged so they could take the pet.
The police allege that following the burglary, the two women returned to Wylie's Portsmouth home and filled the bathtub with water. Walters reportedly told police she held the dog under water until it drowned, while Wylie waited in a nearby room.
Kittery Officers Jeff Shisler, Jay Durgin and Steve Parker, along with Kittery Sgt. Steve Furbish, made the arrest at the Dairy Queen and found Dewey's remains.
Already being held for receiving stolen property, both women were subsequently charged by Eliot Police Officer Thomas Hundley with felony burglary, and they were transported to the York County Jail. They both made bail and were set free pending an arraignment scheduled for July 29.
Portsmouth police were advised by arresting officers from Kittery and Eliot of the dog's death. Additional charges may be filed against the two women in New Hampshire.
Officers from the Newmarket Police Department were also involved in the investigation.
| EJF Home | Find Help | Help the EJF | Comments? | Get EJF newsletter | Newsletters |
| Domestic Violence Book | DV Site Map | DV bibliography | DV index |
| Chapter 9 — Domestic Violence Against Men In The United States |
| Next — Stories Of Abused Men In Maryland |
| Back — Stories Of Abused Men In Louisiana |
This site is supported and maintained by the Equal Justice Foundation.