By Mark LaFlamme,Staff Writer

LEWISTON – A longtime Rumford police officer remembered for being affable and courageous died Wednesday.

Stanley Wagnis, who worked his way from the Oxford County Sheriff’s Office to chief of the Rumford Police Department, died at Central Maine Medical Center. He was 86.

In Rumford, where Wagnis spent his life and built his career, word of his passing spread quickly throughout the day. The former chief was remembered for fearlessness, but also for a capability to communicate with the people he was sworn to protect.

“He would go out to the streets to meet and greet people,” said Girard Lambert, who served for 30 years with the Rumford Police Department and who worked with Wagnis. “Stanley was a people person. He was very hands-on.”

In all, Wagnis spent 35 years in service to the town of Rumford before retiring as chief. He climbed through the ranks from an officer walking a beat, to the rank of sergeant and then investigator.

“Even in his later years, he’d go out on calls. He always made himself available,” Lambert said. “He had a lot of courage.”

“There was a necessary sternness as a policeman,” said Peter Zanoni, a longtime family friend, “but an observable kindness to the citizens of Rumford that he protected.”

As an officer and administrator with the department, Wagnis was known for being frank. It was a trait that was popular or unpopular, depending on whom you asked. Most described him as dedicated to his profession and to his wife, Constance.

“He was always a straight shooter,” said former Rumford Fire Chief Arthur Boivin. “There were a lot of positive things about him.”

Constance Wagnis died in 2001. The couple, who had been married for 56 years, had two daughters, three grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Stanley Wagnis moved into a nursing home shortly after the death of his wife and was described by friends as reasonably healthy in recent years. At the home, he connected with others who had served in the military during World War II.

For three years, Wagnis had served with the Army’s 345th Engineers Regiment, spending much of his service in Africa and Italy.

Zanoni said Wagnis always stayed true to his Lithuanian roots and that he valued freedom as a way of life.

“It was that freedom that he fought for in World War II and in the streets of Rumford as an officer,” Zanoni said. “That old soldier may have died, but his spirit will be the legacy that survives among his family and friends.”