AUGUSTA – A lawyer is trying to find out whether the state paid for a convicted rapist to receive a penile implant the last time he was imprisoned on sexual assault charges.

M. Michaela Murphy said information from the investigation into the assault on her client led her to believe Michael Edward Commeau received the implant, a device that allows men with erectile dysfunction to have an erection.

Murphy has filed a civil lawsuit in Kennebec County Court on behalf of her client, a Winthrop woman whom Commeau was convicted of raping and kidnapping. The civil suit is one method of compelling Commeau to provide her with access to his medical records, she said.

“My clients had been advised by investigators that the penile implant that Mr. Commeau has was implanted because of an injury he received when he was at the Maine State Prison for sexually assaulting victim number five,” Murphy said. “We have also been told that the state approved and-or paid for this device. They couldn’t believe it.”

Commeau, 49, formerly of Lewiston, was accused of stalking Murphy’s client and using a weapon to force her to drive to a secluded Winthrop location where he sexually assaulted her Oct. 4, 2000.

He was sentenced in April to 10 years for kidnapping and 40 years for gross sexual assault. It was his third conviction on gross sexual assault charges in 21 years.

Commeau maintained his innocence throughout his trial and at his sentencing.