A York County Sheriff’s deputy shot and killed a New Hampshire man Wednesday evening in Waterboro.
Deputies went to a home at 99 Rosemont Ave. for a reported disturbance around 6:45 p.m.
Deputy Levi Johnson shot 30-year-old Tyler Woodburn of Newmarket, New Hampshire, when Woodburn started to struggle as deputies tried to take him into custody, said Sheriff William L. King Jr. Woodburn died at the scene.
King said he could not provide further details about the incident and that further information will come from the Attorney General’s Office, which is investigating the shooting. Contacted Thursday night, King said he could not be more specific about why deputies were sent to the home. Danna Hayes, a spokesperson for the AG’s office, said late Thursday in an email that she could not provide further details.
But Hayes did provide a spreadsheet listing the 168 officer-involved shootings since 1997. The number spiked during the height of the pandemic, with 11 reported in 2021. There have been 10 such shootings so far this year in Maine.
A section of Rosemont Avenue was closed Wednesday night while police investigated. Rosemont Avenue is part of the Lake Arrowhead Community in North Waterboro.
Woodburn’s fiancee, Megan Sweeney, said in a phone interview Thursday night that she lives in the home with her parents and three young children, including her 1-year-old daughter, Lilith. Woodburn is Lilith’s father.
Sweeney said she was home during the confrontation and did not believe police had to resort to deadly force. She said Woodburn was not armed, but details of what led to the struggle with Johnson are unclear.
Sweeney said she met Woodburn more than two years ago and they got engaged in 2021. He has been working for the past six months or so at a construction and excavation company in Saco so she could remain home and care for her two children – she also has an 8-year-old son – and Woodburn’s 2-year-old son. She said Woodburn was building a house for her family in Saco, which is nearly finished.
“He was the best dad,” Sweeney said. “He was my daughter’s favorite person in the world. He cared so much for her.”
Sweeney said Woodburn lived with her and her parents in Waterboro. She said he was a fun-loving person who enjoyed riding 4-wheelers and dirt bikes in his spare time. She said Woodburn also was a hard worker who could fix anything mechanical. She regrets that her daughter will never get to know her father.
“We weren’t perfect by any means, but he was the beacon in the storm of life,” she said.
There was no sign of police activity along Rosemont Avenue on Thursday. Houses in the neighborhood are set back from the dirt road and separated by thick woods.
Ken Briggs, who has lived on Rosemont Avenue for 16 years, said the shooting happened down the road from his house. He and his wife, Carol, didn’t hear the gunshots, but went outside when they heard sirens.
“They put up crime scene tape. That’s how I knew something had gone wrong,” he said.
Briggs described the family living in the house as quiet, friendly and decent. He had never seen police there before.
The woman who owns the home said Thursday afternoon that she did not want to speak with a reporter and asked that her family be left alone.
Under state law, Attorney General Aaron Frey’s office investigates all cases involving the use of deadly force by police to determine whether they were justified. Police are permitted to use deadly force if they fear their lives are in danger, if they face the use of deadly force by another person, or reasonably believe that deadly force is necessary to defend another person.
Every police shooting in recent history in Maine has been ruled justified.
Johnson is on administrative leave, which is standard protocol when deadly force is used. He has been a deputy with the sheriff’s office since August 2015 and was a corrections officer at York County Jail from 2014-15, according to his LinkedIn profile.
Staff Writer Dennis Hoey contributed to this story
Comments are not available on this story.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
