Regarding Erick Bennett

Ten days ago, Erick Bennett (a primer for the uninitiated) was pretty excited to be talking to Mother Jones Magazine:

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Today, he is likely not quite as happy.

I’ll just drop the mic and let Erika Eichelberger of Mother Jones take this one:

In early 2004, Erick, his then-wife Angela, their two-year-old twins, and Angela’s eight-year-old son from another relationship were living in a motel room in Bangor, because a recent fire had damaged their apartment. Here is Angela’s description of what happened on January 16, according to the report she filed with the Bangor police. (The department redacted some names for privacy reasons.):

On Friday night, January 16, 2004, in the evening, my husband Erick Matthew Bennett assaulted me repeatedly while we were at the [REDACTED]. He did this in front of our[REDACTED]. [REDACTED] witnessed the entire assaults. First, Erick’s friend[REDACTED] had called to invite Erick and [REDACTED] to watch football the Sunday coming. I asked why [REDACTED] never invited all of us, since [REDACTED] was also married and I got along with [REDACTED]. He stated, “Because [REDACTED] doesn’t like you.” I asked why. And he said “because he thinks you’re irrational.” I said he shouldn’t say those things in front of [REDACTED] and I also said that [REDACTED]hardly knows me and I don’t want [REDACTED] around someone who says he doesn’t like me. Erick got off the bed, put both hands around my neck, squeezed my neck and said “Leave me alone.” A little later we were laying on separate beds. He was reading a Flex magazine. I said I would like to have the check my [REDACTED] sent (to help us because of our house fire 1/9) so I could start a savings account for us in the morning. I was feeling extremely nervous because he had squeezed my neck a little earlier. He got up as if to go to his coat to get the check but instead turned around toward the bed and I just knew we was gonna come after me so I got up to head for the bathroom saying, “Please Erick I’m sorry” but he grabbed me and got me on the floor and pressed me down. Then he started saying “What are you doing? Sit still? Why are you doing this?” As if I was fighting back and he needed to defend himself. At times when I could turn my head I could see him looking over at [REDACTED] to see if he was watching. The [REDACTED] were really upset [ILLEGIBLE] the ground. He pushed my head into the floor and held it there. Finally somehow he stopped and said, “Sit on the bed, I just want to talk to you.” Then he poked me in the head and said in a mean tone “Why do you do this?” I didn’t answer. He clapped both his hands over my ears. I knew I couldn’t argue with him or he would hurt me worse. This isn’t the 1st time he has hurt me. He tries to find excuses to hurt me. Fighting back makes him say I am the crazy one and he has to defend himself. So I didn’t argue or fight back at all. At one point our[REDACTED] came close and held [REDACTED] on the bed but Erick wouldn’t stop. He hit me in the head again and again blaming me for everything. He smacked me upside the head and I was terrified. I even ran out of the room into the cold with the[REDACTED] but it was 30 below that night and the office was over across the way and I was so terrified I went back in. He then said “See [REDACTED] so crazy.” Yet he was so calm. I could see he was in control of everything. He knew what he was doing and then telling the [REDACTED] I need meds. I stayed another week. He acted as if nothing happened. The day after I said “I am so sore.” His response was “Are you getting the flu?” (!) I left when he told me Friday 1/23/04 that he would “kill me” if I kept “running my mouth.” “I will kill you—I hate your f____n guts.” I am too terrified to even set foot in [REDACTED].

A little over a week after the incident, Angela took the couple’s children and drove to her parents’ house. She reported the alleged assault to the Bangor police in early February of that year. “I finally feel strong enough to press charges against him,” Angela wrote in the police report. The couple went to court in early May. After a one day trial, a judge found Erick guilty of assaulting Angela and sentenced him to 60 days in prison. The judge then waived the sentence, and ordered a year’s probation and the completion of a batterer’s intervention program.

I think we all know what Erick’s response will be.  Some combination of “she was lying” and “Mother Jones is a liberal rag.”  But reporting is reporting, and that police report is damning, as is the quote from Christopher Almy, the district attorney for Penobscot County, where Bennett’s trial was conducted:

[domestic-assault conviction in Maine] “is not that simplistic. It’s like any case: If there’s going to be a conviction, you have to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, you have to have witnesses provide credible evidence. The judge would have to believe what the witnesses have to say… It’s about the same anywhere in the country.”

“We have excellent judges here,” says Jim Aucoin, the assistant district attorney who prosecuted the case against Erick. “If they found him guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, I’m sure it happened.”

I think at this point, we can put the nascent “campaign” (such as it is) of Mr. Bennett to bed.

Matthew Gagnon

About Matthew Gagnon

Matthew Gagnon, of Yarmouth, is the Chief Executive Officer of the Maine Heritage Policy Center, a free market policy think tank based in Portland. Prior to Maine Heritage, he served as a senior strategist for the Republican Governors Association in Washington, D.C. Originally from Hampden, he has been involved with Maine politics for more than a decade.