Michael Fowler is suspected of burglarizing at least a dozen residences.
CHESTERVILLE – A Chesterville man faces 15 years in jail after pleading guilty to being a career felon in possession of firearms. The man and teenage co-defendant allegedly stole $100,000 in jewelry, firearms, antiques and household appliances in a three-state crime spree.
Michael Fowler, 47, is suspected of burglarizing at least a dozen residences in Maine, mostly in Androscoggin, Franklin and Kennebec counties. The two are also suspected of burglarizing residences in New Hampshire and Vermont.
A 17-year-old Chesterville male co-defendant hasn’t had his case heard yet.
Franklin County Sheriff’s Department started getting reports of burglaries last August, Detective Tom White said.
On Sept. 19, 2003, two daytime burglaries on Chandler Road in Strong and on Route 142 in Weld were committed one right after the other that set deputies to investigating a burglary spree.
Both residences had been ransacked and entry gained through a back door.
Police were able to get a license plate number for the maroon Pontiac Sunbird involved in the case, White said. The car had been sold to Fowler a month earlier.
The suspects would knock on doors and if someone answered they’d ask for directions. If no one answered, they’d burglarize it, White said.
The two had two-way radios. One person would stay outside and the other would enter the home and gather items to be taken, then that person would notify the one outside that he was ready to leave, White said.
On Sept. 24, 2003, a Jay woman interrupted a burglary at her Warren Hill Road residence. A china doll given to the woman by her grandmother was stolen at the time along with other items.
The doll was never recovered and believed to have been burned in a fire, White said.
Other residential burglaries committed were in Avon, Chesterville, Farmington, Livermore Falls, New Sharon and Vienna, White said.
Three firearms were stolen from a Vienna residence in October 2003, according to U.S. District Court documents.
Fowler allegedly cut the stock of a 12 gauge shotgun stolen from the Vienna residence, a witness stated in the document.
It was discovered through the investigation that some of the burglaries were committed while the defendants were armed, White said.
The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms was alerted to the case.
White, the lead investigator in the western Maine cases, said the sawed-off shotgun was found at a residence in Claremont, N.H., where Fowler had last slept before he was arrested.
White said the gun was stuck under the slats of the bed.
A break in the case came in October 2003 after York County sheriff’s deputies arrested Fowler in connection with burglaries in Lebanon.
During the multi-month investigation many items were recovered, White said.
The detective said $100,000 worth of jewelry was taken into Cambridge, Mass., and sold to pawnshops. The guns were taken to Cambridge and sold to residents of a housing project, White said.
A lot of jewelry was recovered, White said.
It was through the cooperation of multiple police departments that helped solve the case.
“We all worked together,” White said. “It was pretty successful.”
dperry@sunjournal.com
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