Ex-escapee indicted in shootout

ELLSWORTH – An escaped convict who exchanged lunchtime gunfire with police on Main Street two days before Christmas was indicted Tuesday by a Hancock County grand jury on multiple charges, including attempted murder.

Rodney Williams, 27, has been charged with attempted murder for shooting at an off-duty Maine State Police trooper who pursued Williams on foot after Williams crashed a stolen police cruiser on Main Street and tried to run away, according to District Attorney Michael Povich.

Williams was shot in the buttock by police and took refuge in a Main Street shoe store before Hancock County Sheriff Bill Clark convinced him by phone to give himself up peacefully.

Williams also was indicted for aggravated assault for injuring a woman whose car he rammed with the stolen cruiser moments before he crashed the vehicle into the front of a Main Street travel agency, Povich said Tuesday. Georgia Mitchell of Eustis was driving west through the intersection of Main, State and Water streets when Williams drove the cruiser into the oncoming lane of traffic and struck her car, he said.

“He caused some bodily injury to her,” Povich said. “We heard she had a sprained spleen.”

The Dec. 23 incident began in Waldo County when Williams and another inmate were being driven by a Waldo County sheriff’s deputy to a state prison in Windham. After Williams feigned illness, the deputy pulled over by the side of Route 3 west of Belfast, and Williams attacked him, stole his gun and forced him to drive toward Ellsworth, according to police.

Williams left the deputy and another inmate unharmed in the town of Penobscot before driving to Ellsworth and crashing the cruiser, police have said.

Williams also was indicted in Hancock County on charges of criminal threatening, reckless conduct, aggravated criminal mischief, criminal mischief, possession of a firearm by a felon and escape. Povich said the multiple charges of criminal threatening and reckless conduct stem from Williams’ allegedly pointing the deputy’s stolen gun at police and the shoe store owner.

Last week, Williams was indicted in Waldo County on charges of kidnapping, robbery, criminal threatening, theft, assault on an officer, possession of a firearm by a prohibited person and escape.

Povich has said that despite the dual indictments of Williams, there likely would be just one trial.

Povich said Williams is expected to be arraigned in Hancock County Superior Court sometime next week.