AUGUSTA — A report released today by the Office of the Maine Attorney General says officers were justified when they shot and killed Marine Lt. James Popkowski, 37, of Medway, outside the Togus veterans’ hospital on July 8.

Police believed their lives were in danger when they fired shots at Popkowski, the report said.

The report also said Popkowski had made death threats against Togus health care officials, whom he blamed for withholding medications he needed to fight a rare blood disorder.

According to the report:

“On July 5, 2010, a few days before his death, Mr. Popkowski sent a series of messages through a social networking site to his biological mother in Massachusetts. On July 5 at 4:51 p.m., Mr. Popkowski wrote:

Mother…seeing the VA has not filled critical prescriptions in over three month…no surprise of my weight loss…if the cancer returns, whether it is the VA’s fault, or not…the children of the Director of VA Togus, Maine will grow up fatherless…just as my daughter will due to this man’s utter incompetence…I know where he lives…I know his schedule…I know what he drives…I have pics of his entire family…he is a dead man walking!

Three minutes later (4:54 p.m.), Mr. Popkowski added:

…in fact, I have his name printed on some specially modified rounds.”

Video from Popkowski shooting scene
Attorney General’s Findings in the Death of James F. Popkowski

 

 

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