Death in police bathroom ends lifetime of troubles
By BETTY ADAMS
Staff Writer Kennebec Journal & Morning Sentinel 02/21/2008

AUGUSTA -- The man found dead in the lobby bathroom of the Augusta Police Department last weekend was a registered sex offender who had no other place to sleep that night.

But that tells only a portion of the story of Dean J. Sawyer, 51, who fought mental illness, alcoholism and substance abuse with little success, according to his former wife, Laurette Theriault.

Theriault, of Casco, is scraping up money to try to bury the man she prefers to remember as "a good guy."

Sawyer had spent more than two years behind bars for shooting a man in 1999 during a drunken argument in Cumberland County. He was released from Maine State Prison on July 6, 2007.

"When he got out of prison, he had no place to go," Theriault said. "Nobody wanted him around. As an ex-wife, I did what I could to help him. But I did not want him living with me."

The shooting, which left him facing an attempted-murder charge, wasn't Sawyer's first bout of trouble, and wouldn't be his last.

The sex offense that put him on the state's Sex Offender Registry -- unlawful sexual contact with a 13-year-old girl -- occurred in Norway on Dec. 25, 1982, at the girl's home, according to an Oxford County Superior Court hearing transcript. Sawyer was sentenced to two years in prison, with all but one year suspended, for the sex offense.

In 1996, he was convicted of being a habitual offender and driving under the influence.

Even in prison, he ran into problems, and was one of a dozen state prison inmates indicted in May 2006 by a Knox County grand jury on charges of trafficking in prison contraband and possession of drugs. He served an additional 120 days on a trafficking conviction.

More recently, he spent time in Kennebec County jail, serving a 50-day sentence for two counts of failing to register as a sex offender.

He was released Feb. 5, registered with Augusta police as a sex offender and died four days later.

The night before Sawyer died, Theriault said Augusta police contacted her, asking whether she would pay to lodge her former husband in a hotel that night. She said she fears he was turned away from other shelters because he was intoxicated.

When she declined, police allowed Sawyer to sleep in the lobby of the station, where there's a long wooden bench.

The weather was bad and heavy snow was predicted. Sawyer stayed in the lobby for a while, police said, then locked himself in an adjacent public bathroom, where he apparently drank several beers, police said.

The next day, Feb.10, Theriault said she was awakened by a Cumberland County sheriff's deputy saying her ex-husband had been found dead.

Theriault said she believes the stress of being forced to register as a sex offender sent him back to alcohol.

Sawyer already had been turned away from the veterans' hospital in Togus, Theriault said, as well as a boarding house on Eastern Avenue, near the Route 17 entrance to Togus, where he penned his last letter to her.

Officials at Togus said they could not discuss their dealings with Sawyer without written permission from his son, Steven Sawyer, who is listed as next of kin.

The state Medical Examiner's report on the cause of death is not yet complete, a spokesman said Tuesday, and toxicology tests may take weeks. The approximate time of death is listed at 5:15 a.m. Feb. 10.

A medical evaluation of Sawyer -- performed by a doctor at Togus two days after Sawyer was released from prison on the Cumberland County shooting charge -- said Sawyer had a "mood disorder with psychotic features."

The report listed Sawyer as taking medication -- including Clonazepam and Olanzapine for sleeping -- but categorized him as "clean and sober."

Theriault keeps a photo of the happier days she spent with Sawyer. In one photo from 1974, she is 15 and he's 17.

Theriault said she spent three years married to Sawyer in the mid-1970s. During that time, Sawyer spent three years in the U.S. Army, leaving with a general discharge under honorable conditions.

They divorced, but Theriault said she remained in touch with Sawyer largely because of their son Steven, now 33, who is serving his own five-year prison sentence at Bolduc Correctional Facility in Warren for passing a roadblock and other driving-related offenses.

Theriault said she believes Steven Sawyer will be furloughed from prison to attend a small, private funeral for his father.

"He hasn't seen his dad in over 10 years," Theriault said. "That made me so sad. I tried and tried and tried to get (prison officials) to allow them to visit each other while they were in the same jail, and they wouldn't."

A classification officer at the prison said the men may have seen each other in the prison.

Theriault said she plans to have Sawyer cremated. The Department of Veterans Affairs, she said, will reimburse her $300, and she's activating a credit card to pay the remainder of the $1,150 bill.

She said she lives on a disability income and can't afford to pay to bury her former husband. She said she would be grateful for any help and can be contacted at 655-6022.

"I just can't let him sit there," she said. "I can't do that; it's not me. He deserves better."

Augusta police Lt. Kevin Lully said Sawyer's death is the subject of an investigation by the Augusta Police Department.

"Our chief wants to make sure we did what we could to protect his safety," Lully said.

Betty Adams -- 621-5631

badams@centralmaine.com

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