WEST ATHENS — Another victim of bloody fights at this year’s West Athens Fourth of July parade came forward Monday to say he was attacked, unprovoked, after a traffic accident along the parade route.
Lucas Drinkwater, 24, of Dexter, said he was taken by ambulance to a Skowhegan hospital where he received six stitches under his right eye, two stitches on his lower lip and had his teeth chipped and loosened in the melee.
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His girlfriend, Christina Tirrell, 25, said the driver of a pickup truck was attempting to do a burnout — a smoky spin of tires on pavement — when the truck went into reverse and onto the hood of her car, all the way up to the windshield. She said when she attempted to exchange insurance information, one of the two men in the truck attacked Drinkwater and punched him bloody.
She said she dialed 911.
“It was really scary — I was crying to 911,” Tirrell said Monday. “The lady on the phone was really nice; she kept me calm. I didn’t know why it happened. We were confused why all that had just broken out of nowhere. It was a bloody mess everywhere.”
State troopers, game wardens, Somerset County sheriff’s deputies and an ambulance responded to the reports of fighting.
Lt. Donald Pomelow of Maine State Police Troop C Barracks in Skowhegan said Trooper Chris Carr’s investigation into the incidents continues this week.
“I’m assuming there will probably be charges,” Pomelow said. “There was some difficulty at first due to some conflicting information at the scene.”
Another man who said he was attacked in the same incident, Louie Johnson, said in an interview last week that the truck he was a passenger in had been involved in a minor fender-bender that day.
Johnson, 21, of Madison, said he was attacked, unprovoked, by 15-20 people and dragged from the truck and punched and kicked and struck with a metal bar when the parties attempted to exchange insurance information.
He said he was kicked in the head through the back window of the truck, which was broken and covered in plastic from an unrelated incident.
He said he was simply defending himself when he began swinging at his attackers. He said “everyone was just drunk, crazy.”
Johnson could not be reached for comment Monday.
Drinkwater said Monday that Johnson’s injuries may have been in retaliation for what happened to him and to his girlfriend’s car, which was noticeably damaged on Monday.
“I got out of the car and as soon as I got out the guy came out through plastic on the (rear) window of the truck and attacked me,” Drinkwater said. “I ended up on the ground. It was a melee — it was a mob.”
Residents of Valley Road, where the parade and an Independence Day play in a local gravel pit have been performed for nearly 40 years, said there were as many as 15 separate fights at this year’s event.
Also marring the parade this year was heavy drinking and signs asking women to take off their tops, sales of drug paraphernalia, requests for drug “doses” and truck wheel spinning that sent tire shards and smoke into the air.
Drinkwater said he has gone to the parade for the past five years and liked the “hippie” theme of peace and love.
“We were there for the same reasons that they founded the parade, just to be happy and enjoy it,” he said. “It’s a colorful, enjoyable time. I always look forward to going to the West Athens parade every year. It’s supposed to be about freedom of speech and peace and a good wholesome fun time that you could bring your family to.”
Organizers of the annual play by In Spite of Life Players say they are considering moving the performance and possibly eliminating the parade because of the violence this year.
Residents of Valley Road have said they enjoyed the parade in years passed, but now would like to see it stopped. The issue of the parade could be raised at the annual town meeting next March, Athens First Selectman Bruce Clavette said last week.
Doug Harlow — 612-2367
dharlow@centralmaine.com
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