BANGOR – A federal magistrate judge has denied inmate Michael Chasse’s request for a new trial based on his claims that he was denied the right to testify at his November 1998 trial in Dover-Foxcroft. During the fourth day of that trial, Chasse escaped during a walk from the jail to the courtroom, prompting a melee with law officers and an extensive ground search that captured statewide publicity.

Chasse was on trial for robbery, burglary and assault stemming from a February 1997 incident at the home of Robert Cohen of Brewer. Cohen is the brother of former Secretary of Defense William Cohen.

At the trial, Chasse was “voluntarily absent” from the courtroom and thus waived his right to testify, according to conclusions made by the Maine Supreme Court.

It would have been an “unreasonable application of federal law” to re-open the trial at the point Chasse requested and such action carried a “huge potential to completely derail the trial,” according to a decision filed Oct. 10 and written by U.S. Magistrate Judge Margaret J. Kravchuk.

Chasse was sentenced to 12 years in prison on the convictions.

Last April, a second trial at the Knox County Superior Court resulted in an additional 14-year prison sentence for Chasse for convictions that resulted from the violent escape in Dover-Foxcroft.