Oxford County commissioners say their sheriff, who faces being removed from office, potentially committed theft when he sold dozens of guns from evidence without asking permission from the original owners.
In response to a Bangor Daily News investigation in August, the commissioners hired an outside investigator to look into Oxford County Sheriff Christopher Wainwright’s sale of 52 guns and gun parts from evidence to J.T. Reid’s Gun Shop in Auburn, commissioners said this week.
The report from investigator Maria Fox has not been released. But the BDN found Wainwright did not tell county finance officials about or get their permission to make the 2021 deals. He did not record the deals on paper. And he did not notify owners or the owners’ families that he was selling their guns, or advertise them if a gun’s owner wasn’t clear.
While Maine law allows police to sell guns from evidence, it first requires them to make sure no one else has a right to the property.
After the BDN’s examination and the independent investigator’s work, there is the potential that Wainwright violated Maine’s criminal code for theft, which is one reason why the commissioners decided that they will ask the governor to remove the elected sheriff from office, two commissioners said.
Their comments mark the first time they have discussed the potential theft violation, though they were careful to emphasize that they were not saying a crime had occurred, only the possibility. Wainwright has not been charged with a crime.
“We’re not accusing the sheriff of committing any crime. It’s just the potential has made us lose faith in his ability to execute his duties. I have talked to a lot of citizens over the past several months who want to know when we’re going to do something about the sheriff,” Commissioner Tim Turner said. “They question his ability to lead the department.”
On Jan. 16, the commissioners decided they will send a complaint to Gov. Janet Mills, asking for Wainwright’s removal. They may vote next week to finalize the complaint and send it.
In Maine, commissioners have no power to discipline or fire sheriffs, or place them on leave while they are investigated. The Maine Constitution states that only the governor may remove a sheriff “upon complaint, due notice and hearing” if she finds the sheriff “is not faithfully or efficiently performing any duty imposed upon the sheriff by law.”
Scott Ogden, a spokesperson for Mills, declined to comment further about what kind of process the governor would follow to make her decision, since she has not yet received a complaint from Oxford County.
The potential theft violation stems from when the sheriff “sold the weapons from the evidence locker, but he failed to attempt to contact the owners. He has to make a due diligence to contact the owners before he can sell,” Turner said.
“Potentially there’s a theft violation there. That’s something that a court would have to decide, obviously, plus somebody would have to file a complaint, and nobody has filed a complaint,” he continued.
How past gun owners would know that Wainwright sold their firearms in order to file a complaint — likely with the attorney general’s office, which typically investigates law enforcement — is not clear. The county has not notified the attorney general’s office either.
“At this point the commissioners have not discussed or made a decision with respect to referring matters that are the subject of the complaint to the governor for any sort of criminal evaluation,” said Amy Dieterich, an attorney for Oxford County.
As long as they could legally possess them, the gun owners should have been given first refusal to get their firearms back, Commissioner David Duguay said. Instead, he said, the sheriff agreed to trade them in to a dealer in exchange for credit toward the purchase of other firearms for the sheriff’s office — though it’s not clear exactly which ones the office received because there is no paperwork.
“We don’t believe there was any personal gain,” Duguay said. “We were given a credit, which is really not an appropriate way to do things.”
Instead, the county administrator is supposed to act as the purchasing agent for all county departments, according to Maine law.
What’s more, Maine law dictates how police should get rid of property when they do not know who the owner is, or the property remains unclaimed: They are supposed to advertise it in a newspaper, and, if no one claims it within five months, it may be thrown out, donated, surrendered to the person who found it or sold to the highest bidder at a public auction.
The third commissioner, Steven Merrill, did not return a phone call or email requesting an interview.
Wainwright did not directly answer a question about whether he believed selling guns from evidence without getting approval from the owners constituted theft.
No firearms were taken from law-abiding citizens, he said. Some had been in storage for more than 40 years, and most had been used in the commission of a crime or involved in a traumatic event.
They were not returned to offenders who couldn’t possess them due to mental health or substance use concerns, he said, or because they were convicted of a felony or crime of domestic violence.
Some firearms were destroyed because they had an altered or removed serial number, or a sawed-off barrel, he said. Others went to a dealer because they were used in suicides or suicide attempts, and the families did not want them returned.
He did not say whether any families had given the sheriff’s office written permission to take possession.
“All proceeds from the firearms went directly to the purchasing of equipment for the county — saving the taxpayers money,” he said. “Putting these weapons back into the community would have been irresponsible and dangerous, and would have jeopardized the safety of the citizens of Oxford County and the deputies of the Oxford County Sheriff’s Office.”
It appears to be uncommon for police to sell seized or unclaimed firearms. Most larger police departments destroy them, according to a survey of 164 police agencies nationwide. Just 7 percent reported reselling them.