Maine news, sports, weather from Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram, Portland, Maine

July 23, 2012

Dispatches

From staff and news services

BRISTOL

Elderly couple rescued after boat runs aground

An elderly couple was rescued by the Bristol Fire Department and Maine Marine Patrol after their boat ran aground Sunday afternoon near Pemaquid Beach on Johns Bay in Bristol.

Chris Berry, a spokesman for the United States Coast Guard in South Portland, said the couple called 911 on their cellphone around 3:15 p.m. to let authorities know their craft was on rocks and in danger of capsizing.

Berry described the boat as a 22-foot pleasure boat. Rescuers had to remove the couple from the rocks at low tide. They were not injured.

The cause of the accident was under investigation Sunday, and Berry said he didn’t know what might become of the boat, which remains on the rocks.

WINDHAM

Police searching for suspect in robbery at Walgreens

Police are searching for a man captured on camera as he robbed the Walgreens pharmacy at 741 Roosevelt Trail in Windham on Saturday.

Police said the man entered the store about 2:15 p.m. and demanded OxyContin. He did not show a gun and fled in an unknown direction.

Police said the man was white, 5 feet 2 to 5 feet 4 inches tall, and wore a ball cap, sunglasses and a black hooded sweat shirt.

No one was hurt. Police did not say how much OxyContin was taken.

Police asked anyone with information to call Detective Ray Williams at 892-2525.

BATH

Man charged with driving drunk after crashing into pole

A West Bath man was arrested early Sunday and charged with driving drunk after he crashed his car on Route 1 in Bath.

Lt. Stan Cielinski said the driver, 28-year-old Andrew S. McNelley, was heading south when his 2005 Dodge Magnum station wagon hit a utility pole near the Clipper Mart.

Police said the impact snapped the pole into three pieces and the car landed on its roof in the middle of the road. Downed power lines blocked the entrance to the Clipper Mart.

Cielinski said McNelley suffered a scrape to his hand. He was arrested at the scene and charged with operating under the influence of alcohol – a Class D crime. Investigators said alcohol and speed contributed to the crash, which took place around 12:38 a.m.

McNelly was released on $850 bail. He is to appear in West Bath District Court on Sept. 4.

AUGUSTA

LePage: Economic woes are nation’s top worry

Maine Gov. Paul LePage said Saturday that uncertainty over the economy – in short, jobs or lack of jobs – is Americans’ biggest worry, bigger even than the national health care law he has criticized recently.

The governor said in his weekly radio address that he’s hosted workshops in Brunswick, Springvale and Presque Isle with business leaders, who tell him they have jobs, but need skilled workers.

In the Democratic response, Sen. Margaret Craven of Lewiston accused LePage of using “flame-throwing and exaggerated rhetoric” when talking about the national health care law. Craven said

LePage’s refusal to move toward implementing the law is frustrating and counterproductive to public health.

Senate hopefuls talk gun access after Colorado shootings

Two of Maine’s U.S. Senate candidates are weighing in on the need for new gun controls following the shootings that killed 12 in Colorado.

Democrat Cynthia Dill on Saturday called on Congress to renew a ban on assault weapons that expired in 2004.

Dill says one of the weapons seized from the suspect, an AR-15 assault rifle, would have been defined as a “semiautomatic assault weapon” and subject to sharp restrictions under the expired Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994.

(Continued on page 2)

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