A Richmond man shot Wednesday as he allegedly attempted to break into an apartment a second time is expected to be seen by a judge Friday on criminal charges.
Shad A. Hembree, 42, was treated and released Wednesday at MaineGeneral Medical Center in Augusta before being taken to Two Bridges Regional Jail in Wiscasset.
Hembree was shot by Trevor Whitney, 28, of Richmond, as Hembree allegedly tried to break into Whitney’s apartment.
Whitney told a reporter Wednesday afternoon he didn’t want to shoot the man, but when it became clear the intruder was trying to force his way in, he felt he had to take action to protect himself and his girlfriend.
Richmond police Chief Scott MacMaster said police were called around 5:45 a.m. Wednesday by a woman who said a man was in her apartment and her boyfriend was yelling at him to get out.
Whitney said he was getting ready to go to his job at the Loomis armored truck company around 5:30 a.m. when suddenly a man he had never seen before came through unlocked front door into the home Whitney shares with his girlfriend. The man was barefoot and wearing tattered camouflage pants.
Whitney asked the man who he was and what he was doing there, and the man, later identified by police as Hembree, responded by asking the same questions back to him. The man was holding a large metal flashlight, “like he had hostile intent,” Whitney said, and refused to leave.
Whitney said he then picked up his pistol, a Sig Sauer .40-caliber semi-automatic, which he uses for work and which he had left on the couple’s kitchen table, and warned the man, “I will shoot you. You need to leave.”
The man then backed out of the home and started down the exterior stairs from the couple’s apartment, which is above a garage and has a small porch.
However, the man returned and used a flashlight to break the glass out of the door. When it became clear he was trying to get back into the apartment, Whitney fired, striking the intruder in the shoulder.
Hembree also allegedly smashed the windows of a vehicle parked in the driveway.
MacMaster said the victim and the suspect are neighbors but did not know each other and never had had any contact with each other, and their homes — the victim’s at 128 Post Road, the suspect’s at 140 Post Road — are separated by woods.
MacMaster also said Hembree’s actions might be related to mental illness.
While police said they anticipated Hembree would face burglary and other charges, Deputy District Attorney Jonathan Liberman said Thursday afternoon that no criminal complaint had been filed yet.
“I do expect we will be filing charges,” Liberman said, adding that Hembree is expected to appearat 1 p.m. Friday before a judge in Belfast District Court via video from the jail.
Betty Adams — 621-5631
Twitter: @betadams
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