A Hudson man claimed that the man who takes care of his dogs slipped and fell on the ice outside his car, but the injured man and blood on the inside of the dog owner’s car said otherwise.

Merl Knowlton, 59, of Hudson was summoned on a charge of assault after Old Town police Officer Thomas Adams concluded Knowlton was not telling the truth about what happened.

A 46-year-old Old Town man employed by Knowlton to take care of his dogs said that while giving him a ride home, Knowlton punched him on two occasions, once while Knowlton was driving on the road in Hudson and again in the man’s driveway in Old Town.

Knowlton blamed the man for the dogs’ getting a virus and punched him three more times and pushed him out of the car in the Old Town driveway, the Old Town man told Adams.

Knowlton claimed the man had slipped on the ice and fell on his face, but Adams said the cut on the man’s nose was not consistent with such an accident.

Knowlton also claimed that after the fall, the man didn’t get back inside the car, yet Adams found blood on the passenger seat, dashboard and rocker panel.

State police enlisted the help of area police Friday in efforts to find a man who brandished a gun in Levant earlier in the day.

In the incident, the man brandished the gun at another man who took the gun, emptied the magazine clip and returned the gun. The man with the gun then left in a pickup truck, which authorities were looking for throughout the day.

An alert went out and Bangor police officers searched some city streets for the truck. Deputies from the Penobscot County Sheriff’s Department also were looking for the vehicle.

The incident was still being investigated Friday evening, according to a police official.

– Compiled by NEWS reporter Doug Kesseli