Elderly woman tricks intruder Hampden resident fakes heart attack

HAMPDEN – An 80-year-old woman watching the Super Bowl in her home alone faked a heart attack and apparently scared off a man who grabbed her from behind and started pushing her toward a bedroom, police said Monday.

About the time the woman called 911, a police officer became suspicious when he saw a pickup truck parked near the home.

That led to the arrest of Daniel Thanem, 45, of Winterport, a convicted sex offender in Alabama, who was charged with aggravated criminal trespass and assault for Sunday’s incident.

On Monday he was being held at the Penobscot County Jail on $1,000 cash bail. He was on probation at the time of the arrest, but it was not clear for which previous case.

Thanem was convicted of rape in Alabama in 1984 and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

The woman was watching Sunday’s Super Bowl at about 10 p.m. when she spotted a man walking through her house toward her bedroom, said police Sgt. Dan Stewart.

When the woman asked what the man was doing in her home, he grabbed her from behind and began pushing her toward the bedroom, Stewart said.

It does not appear that the intruder used a weapon, but Stewart said he was 6 foot 1 and 250 pounds.

At the entrance to her bedroom, the woman braced herself against the door frame, struggling to break free from the man’s grasp.

She told him she was having a heart attack, Stewart said.

“The lady had enough common sense to keep her wits about her to fake a heart attack and avoid becoming another victim,” he said.

After the woman told the intruder her heart medication was in her car, he dragged her to the garage to retrieve the medication, Stewart said. Once they returned to the home, the man pushed the woman into a bathroom and told her to stay there. He then fled.

The woman called police.

During a routine patrol, Hampden police Officer Ben Eyles pulled up behind a pickup truck parked on the side of the road close to the victim’s home, Stewart said. The driver told Eyles “he was going home from a Super Bowl party and was going to take a nap,” Stewart said, noting that the officer found his response odd.

Although the woman did not see her attacker from the front, she described the boots and coat he was wearing, Stewart said. Her description of the attacker’s garb matched the clothes worn by the man Eyles was questioning just up the road.

Within minutes of the attack, Thanem was arrested and taken to Penobscot County Jail.

The woman told police she had been noticing odd occurrences in recent weeks, such as finding someone in her garage a couple of weeks ago and finding cigarette butts around her home, where nobody smokes, Stewart said.