FRYEBURG — A 44-year-old Andover man was arrested Saturday on charges that he threatened a canoeist with an ax and other implements.

David A. Berry of Airport Road was charged with criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon at 12:40 p.m. Chief Philip Weymouth of the Fryeburg Police Department said Berry was bailed at the police station.

Weymouth said the incident occurred after a couple in a canoe passed Berry’s campsite on a sandbar on the Saco River. The man in that first canoe told Berry’s children to throw water balloons at their friends in a canoe behind them. After the balloons hit the woman in the next  canoe, the woman’s boyfriend, Timothy Davidson, 25, of Lewiston stopped the canoe and got out to speak to the children.

Davidson told police that an argument ensued, and Berry swung at him with an ax and missed. He said Berry also swung at him with a paddle and took a towel from his tent, saying it was wrapping a gun and that he would shoot Davidson.

Davidson resumed his trip down the river and reported the incident to river patrol officers with the Fryeburg Police Department when they came up the river in a boat. Weymouth said Berry admitted that he threatened Davidson because of the way he was speaking to his kids, but that he didn’t have a gun.

No one was injured in the incident.

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