RUMFORD — Police Chief Stacy Carter believes that merging Rumford and Mexico police departments to deal with the continued uptick in most crimes would be beneficial to both towns.

The issue is being studied by residents and officials from both towns.

“I believe that it would help,” Carter said Tuesday afternoon. “I believe that we would be able to gain efficiencies out of a merged department by sharing staff and allocating the staff a little better, but it’s to be determined if there is a cost savings or if it will actually work.”

For now, he said he believes there is justification to add a second detective to his department, which consists of 10 officers, including himself.

“Compared to this time last year, we’re 222 calls more than (we had) a year ago,” he said. “For one week since May 27, we’ve had 109 complaints, which is a lot for a week here. I think, more importantly, the justification for the second detective is the nature of the calls which require investigations.”

Namely, they are sex offenses and child abuse complaints, he said.

For Rumford’s 2013-14 fiscal year, budget cuts eliminated a second detective position and an administrative officer. During that fiscal year, which ends June 30, there were 27 complaints compared to 13 in the previous fiscal year with that second detective, Carter said.

“It’s doubled,” he said. “And those types of calls require a lot of investigation and follow-up. And to put that on one detective isn’t appropriate, as far as the level of investigation that is going to occur, because while he’s investigating those, there are other crimes being reported that need adequate attention, as well.

“Some may say, ‘Well, patrol officers can do that,'” Carter said. “Well, no, because there is also these increased calls for service, so they’re handling that. The bottom line is we need another detective so there can be adequate investigations of these crimes.

“Sex offenses and child abuse certainly have priority. Then we’re doing the burglary investigations, you know, or this recent robbery,” he said.

He was referring to his department’s case against Randall J. Chapman, 37, of 48 Essex Ave. in Rumford. Chapman had been wanted since an incident on the night of May 19 when he fled over a guardrail toward the Androscoggin River with police in pursuit.

Chapman is accused of slashing a kidnapped victim’s face during a robbery while holding him at knife-point inside the man’s vehicle as he drove to an ATM to withdraw more money, according to Rumford police Capt. Daniel Garbarini’s May 21 affidavit seeking arrest warrants.

Maine State Police caught Chapman on May 28 in Gray.

“That (case) took many man-hours with several officers to bring that to a conclusion, and actually, it’s not even done yet weeks after it,” Carter said. “In fact, we’re still investigating that trying to close it up. But they’re very complex cases.

“In order to have successful prosecution, we need to be able to put in the time and do due diligence and investigate them,” he said. “So, there’s certainly a need (for another detective). On top of all that as time permits, there’s an abundant number of drug crimes that are occurring, and drug crimes are a nexus to most other crimes because of drug addiction, like, you know, the robbery.”

Rumford police are dealing with an influx of heroin, crack cocaine and prescription medicines, Carter said.

“There has been some heroin use all along, but we’re seeing an increase in the use of it, just because of availability and, it’s not that expensive,” he said. “But it is very dangerous, because across the state and across the country, there’s been numerous heroin overdoses.”

Carter said there was another robbery recently, albeit not as violent. In that incident, he said a person was assaulted and money taken, but it wasn’t reported, because the victim didn’t want to cooperate with police or pursue charges.

“Those are drug crimes that are occurring and we need to be able to adequately respond and investigate those,” he said.

Breaking down the 27 sex offense and child abuse or neglect cases — which can be physical or sexual assaults — there were 14 child abuse or neglect cases compared to nine last fiscal year, he said.

For sex offenses, which can be sexual abuse of a minor, gross sexual assault or unlawful sexual contact, there were 13 cases reported last year compared to four the year before, he said.

The average amount of time a detective puts into these types of investigations varies. For example, there are the number of witnesses or interviews that must be conducted and the nature of any crime scene if there is one, depending on when it’s reported, Carter said.

Some are reported late, some aren’t, and some are quickly reported, he said.

“So there’s substantial follow-up in that,” he said. “In some cases, it’s a child offending against another child, and when you have two detectives or the manpower to investigate those, a lot of times that’s learned behavior and to do justification for it, you need to go past this initial or this reported offense and find out if this child was a victim and take it steps further.

“But when you don’t have the manpower and you have more of these crimes coming in, we don’t always get past that initial investigation,” Carter said.

If the department had more manpower, drug arrests would increase, he said, “because we don’t have the manpower to always investigate those if we’re investigating these other (crimes).

“So the crime is out there,” Carter said. “There’s a huge drug issue in this community. I mean, we’re not alone. It’s happening all across the state and country, but I think what you see as you look around the state, home invasions and daytime burglaries where people are stealing to support their drug habit, those crimes are going up,” he said.

Mental health issues are also increasing, Carter said.

“Those can tie an officer up for a considerable amount of time,” Carter said.  “As other calls come in, there may be only one officer or there may not be an officer if they’re both tied up on that.

“Our goal is to make this a safe place — a safe community — and we need the resources to do that,” he said. “Times are changing and I think things are getting worse. For the safety of the officers and the safety of the citizens, you can’t continue to cut … I hope that citizens recognize the need and support it.”

People who want to see the overall municipal budget and Carter’s budget reduced have accused him of using scare tactics, such as saying child sex abuse cases have doubled in a year or that crime continues to increase as Rumford’s population decreases.

“That’s not a scare tactic,” Carter said. “That’s the truth. If the truth scares you, then so be it. But my intention isn’t to scare anybody. My intentions are to tell the truth. We’re not making this stuff up. We’re not telling people to report these crimes. This is where we’re at.”

tkarkos@sunjournal.com