Protesters Focus on Representative Lanigan

Domestic violence activists marched along Main Street Thursday.

Photo: Lisa Blanchette

From Maine State House news reports

Domestic violence activists brought news crews to Sanford Thursday to highlight their cause in the wake of State Rep. Lucas Lanigan’s embroilment with domestic violence charges.

Finding our Voices, a non-profit awareness and advocacy group, led the march from Aroma Joe’s down toward City Hall. Some were carrying signs with Lanigan’s photograph. One sign read “Real Men Respect Women.”

This followed the opening Wednesday of a legislative ethics probe into Lanigan’s conduct and the stripping of Lanigan from his committee assignment.

The actions in the legislature Wednesday stem from Lanigan’s arrest last November on a charge of felony domestic assault for allegedly choking his wife for 20 minutes during a confrontation at the safe storage units where Lanigan works.

Lanigan denies the charges and decried the legislative inquiry.

“I haven’t been given any due process through this whole situation,” he told a reporter for News Center Maine. “It seems I’ve been tried, convicted and executed by my peers on the Democratic side.”

House Majority Leader Matt Moonen, a Portland Democrat, had introduced the order for the House Ethics Committee to investigate Lanigan. He said the “gravity of the allegations” against Lanigan raises questions about whether Lanigan “continues to hold the public’s trust and the ethical and moral standing necessary to serve as a member of the Maine House of Representatives,” according to Maine Public.

Defending Lanigan’s rights, Assistant Minority Leader Katrina Smith, a Republican from Palermo, said it was not the legislature’s role to usurp the role of the courts.

“We as a body are entering a slippery slope,” Smith said. “If we assume a posture that, regardless of the right to be innocent until proven guilty, then we are applying an unfair standard to members of this body.”

The vote was 74-69, according to WMTW TV. In a separate action, Speaker Ryan Fecteau removed Lanigan from his seat on the Labor Committee.

Lanigan won re-election by one vote against Democratic challenger Patty Kidder.

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