March 29, 2024
BANGOR DAILY NEWS (BANGOR, MAINE

Attack sparks fears> Hancock attacker remains at large

HANCOCK — A gun-wielding masked man’s recent attack on a Hancock woman has frightened some local residents who have started locking their doors and stopped taking daily walks in the sparsely populated neighborhood.

“I never used to lock my door, and now I keep locking myself out of my house,” said Eastside Road resident Mary Bolshaw Thursday. She has stopped walking a two-mile loop that takes her along Ferry Road where the assault occurred on Dec. 14. “I don’t go out. Even at dusk, it can be hairy.”

Longtime Ferry Road residents Carl and Wendy Karush only take walks together now, according to their 19-year-old daughter Becky, who was home from Wesleyan University in Connecticut this week. Her parents were away on vacation when the Bangor Daily News called.

Hancock surveyor Ed Pare lives on Grant Road about a quarter of a mile from the victim’s house. He walks past her home at dusk every day. He has not given up his evening exercise, but he and his wife are not allowing their two children to play in a playhouse near the woman’s house. The couple have also started locking their doors.

“I am a little nervous,” he said Friday. “On the other hand, you can’t let the guy dictate what you do.”

It has also been unnerving for local residents that the assailant is still at large.

Just after 5 p.m. on Dec. 14, the 26-year-old Hancock woman returned from work to her Ferry Road residence. When she walked to her mailbox, she reportedly heard someone running down the road. When she looked up, a young man wearing a ski mask, orange jacket and jeans grabbed her and tried to pull her into the woods, according to Hancock County Sheriff’s Department Detective Stephen McFarland.

When she tried to resist, the masked man reportedly punched her in the face and hit her on the back of the head with what she believes was a gun. He then took off toward the Eastside Road. She ran home and called a neighbor who notified the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department.

The woman was taken by ambulance to Maine Coast Memorial Hospital where she received stitches for a cut on her head.

Hancock County deputies and Maine State Police scoured the area, but were unable to find the assailant. Nor do they have any “definite suspects” two weeks after the incident, McFarland said.

“It’s not dead-ended. We are actively working the case,” the detective said, noting there are two witnesses who saw a man fitting the assailant’s description either walking fast or running along a road near where the incident occurred.

Meanwhile, the Hancock Police Department has stepped up its patrol of the neighborhood. The 18-member volunteer force provides daily patrols throughout the town.

“There is quite a lot of concern,” said Hancock Police Chief Charlie Wheeler Thursday. In the days since the attack, he said, “People wanted to know if they or their kids could go out.”

Wheeler can’t remember an incident of this kind ever occurring in town. He has been police chief most of the years since the citizen force was formed more than two decades ago.

“We’ve got a pretty quiet town. We don’t have any big problems actually, and we want to keep it that way,” he said.


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