CHERRYFIELD, Maine — Maine State Police officers were at a house at 62 Tenan Lane on Friday, investigating an incident in which, according to a neighbor, three shots were fired Thursday night.
Police have released no details about what happened, other than to describe it as a “suspicious incident” and to say that the state police Major Crimes Unit is investigating. There is no ongoing public safety risk, police have said.
Troopers were keeping watch on the property early Friday afternoon while state police detectives were canvassing the neighborhood to ask nearby residents if they had information about what happened.
At around 2 p.m., a state police evidence response truck arrived at the house and technicians began examining the property, which is set back in the woods along a long dirt driveway on the west side of the road. Candy cane-shaped Christmas decorations were mounted on fence posts in the dooryard of the small house while yellow police tape was tied to trees lining the driveway.
Kaytie Fickett, a neighbor two doors down on Tenan Lane, said she and her husband had left the house briefly to go to the store Thursday evening when the incident happened around 9 p.m. They had left their 12 year-old daughter in charge of their two younger children while they were gone, but found the end of Tenan Lane blocked off by a fire truck when they returned.
“My daughter had no idea what was going on,” Fickett said.
A relative who lives across the street later told Fickett that she had heard three gunshots before the police and fire trucks arrived.
Fickett said she did not know anything about what happened, or what may have caused it, but that she has grown more concerned for her family’s safety in recent months. Washington County has seen an uptick in violent crime in the past couple of years and since November 2021 has had six people killed in alleged murders.
“There’s a huge drug problem in Washington County,” Fickett said. “It’s scary.”
She said she will not leave her children at home without an adult present again.
“I don’t really feel safe,” Fickett said. “I lock the doors even when I am at home.”