The Maine Supreme Court occassionally holds oral arguments at Maine high schools. They were in Bingham on October 7, 2025. Here's a link to the video. Fast forward, the first 50 minutes has nothing.
In State v. Dennis Lemieux (KEN 2024-341), at 1:14:00 the lawyer for LeMieux, Dan Lawson, mentions Counterman v. Colorado: a 2023 Supreme Court case involving stalking/terrorizing charges. Here's a short animated video explaining it.
SCOTUS sent the case back to Colorado, and Counterman's conviction was overturned. You can read more at SPARC (Stalking Awareness and Prevention Center), but basically the case is about the standard for determining whether certain speech (such as social media posts), are free speech or true threats that aren't protected speech.
The decision in Counterman should have helped me regarding the stalking charges against me...but it didn't.
The other case the Maine justices heard was Robbins v Maine Commission on Public Defense Services (KEN 2025-137). The class action 6th Amendment case was filed by the ACLU in 2022. Being discussed was habeas corpus...whether criminal defendants should be released if not appointed attorneys within a set number of days.
There's already been a decision by a Maine judge, Micaela Murphy, in Robbins. Before she became a judge, Micaela Murphy was a lawyer for Madawaska's Dennis Dechaine. Murphy said when the state fails to appoint counsel, defendants should be released, and once attorneys are available, the cases can be refiled.
The reason the order isn't being implemented is there's a concern that dangerous people might be released. Also, attorneys for the Maine Commission for Public Defense Services claim that the ACLU hasn't proved that any class action defendant was withoucount sl during crucial stages of their case.
HELLO! I was arrested on 7-10-24 and didn't get an attorney at all in eAroostook County; and when I failed to appear (FTA) to pick a jury, I was arrested and spent 4 nights in jail. The case against me was dismissed for no other reason than District Attorney Todd Collins said I had been punished enough for the FTA.
Regarding charges against me filed in Lincoln County for stalking and violation of a protection order, the state of Maine's witness claims that my social media posts were threatening and caused distress. I wasn't given an attorney regarding those charges until September! By then 5 Lewiston police officers had breeched my door, and taken my Iphone without a warrant; they then released me from jail after midnight, two miles from my home...that's real distress, not imagined or invented.
I wonder if the students did any research afterward. Schools ought to teach a course in the Constitution. The decision is not popular with domestic violence groups; you can read why at the Stalking Prevention & Awarenes Resource Center.
