BANGOR – A Penobscot County jury took about two hours to find a Brewer man innocent Thursday of charges that he robbed two women at gunpoint in Hampden last summer.

Jeffrey Simpson, 36, was acquitted of two counts of robbery in connection with the July 2001 incident, in which police had alleged he broke into a Main Road North home, brandished a gun and demanded money.

During the burglary, Simpson allegedly struck one of the women with the gun when she wasn’t moving quickly enough, the woman told police.

Justice Andrew Mead presided.

After the jury’s verdict in Penobscot County Superior Court, Simpson was returned to the neighboring jail, where he is being held on $50,000 cash bail on unrelated robbery and burglary charges stemming from a January incident.

Police at Thursday’s daylong trial had testified that a bizarrely acting Simpson, who has several felony convictions dating back to 1983, was arrested in Houlton hours after the Hampden burglary.

During the brief trial, Simpson’s attorney raised questions about the police investigation and presented a witness who cast doubt on whether a gun was involved.

At the time of Simpson’s arrest in Houlton, Bangor police were looking for him after a woman reported one day earlier that Simpson had brandished a gun and demanded money from her as she was walking to Second Street Park to get her children. That case is pending.

Simpson, whom prosecutors call a career criminal, faces new charges stemming from a January incident in which he allegedly forced his way into a Bangor apartment and demanded money from those inside.

A woman inside that Second Street apartment said Simpson held the barrel of a gun flush against the left side of her head near her temple to try to get money from her.

The Bangor incident took place within days of his release from jail on bail from the Hampden incidents, according to police.