WELLS – A disabled lobsterman who received a $500,000 log home from the TV show “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” has had assault and armed robbery convictions, as well as arrests for drunken driving, a newspaper reported.

The Portland Press Herald looked into Doug Goodale’s criminal record after receiving several tips from Wells residents.

Goodale served time as a teenager for an armed robbery in which investigators said Burger King employees were forced at gunpoint into a cooler; in 1997, he was given a suspended sentence for misdemeanor assault, the newspaper said.

The criminal offenses, as well as two drunken driving convictions in Maine, raise questions about the screening process for the TV show.

A spokeswoman for ABC’s “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” declined to discuss specifics of Goodale’s criminal history, most of which occurred before he lost his arm in a fishing accident.

It was the story of the 1997 fishing accident that caught the show’s attention. Goodale had to amputate his arm to free himself when it became caught in his winch on his boat. He made it back to port, where he was taken to the hospital.

The TV show’s online application form asks candidates whether they have ever been convicted of a felony or a misdemeanor, or whether they have been the defendant in a lawsuit.

Neither the show nor Goodale will say whether his application form submitted by a family member included the information, or whether a criminal record would have disqualified his application.

Goodale said he’s barred under an agreement with the show’s producers from talking about the show until it airs, possibly next month.

Goodale’s ex-wife was one of those who contacted the newspaper after her ex-husband’s story was published. She thinks Goodale’s past is part of the story and should not be glossed over or ignored by the television show.

“He’s had a hard life, but he brought it all on himself,” said Becky Sellers, who was married to Goodale from 1985 until 1992.

One reason “Extreme Makeover” may not have known about Goodale’s conviction for armed robbery is because of a mix-up over his birthday.

A spokeswoman for the show said it was told that Goodale was born on Jan. 3, 1965. But his court records up until 1997 list his birthday as Jan. 3, 1964. That would have made him 18 and an adult at the time of his arrest and conviction for armed robbery.

Goodale’s record of driving offenses lists his birthday as Jan. 3, 1965. So does his Maine driver’s license, and his birth certificate, which is on file at the Wells town hall.

Officials with Katahdin Cedar Log Homes, the Aroostook County-based company that supplied the materials to build the home, estimated its value at $500,000. The company also sent 25 workers, who stained the house inside and out during the last two days of the project.

David Gordon, the company’s president, said he wasn’t troubled by Goodale’s trouble with the law. “Absolutely not, as long as he paid his debt to society,” he said.