A former top-ranking supervisor at the Somerset County Jail in Madison, above, was fired earlier this year while he was facing allegations of domestic violence involving another jail employee. Morning Sentinel file

MADISON — A former top-ranking supervisor at the Somerset County Jail was fired earlier this year while he was facing allegations of domestic violence involving another jail employee.

Cameron Arcidi, 27, of Madison, was charged July 15 with one Class D count of domestic violence assault and one Class D count of domestic violence stalking, court records show.

Arcidi, assistant jail administrator with the rank of captain, was placed on administrative leave the same day, said Somerset County Sheriff Dale Lancaster, whose office operates the Madison jail. Arcidi’s employment with the county was terminated Sept. 4, according to meeting minutes of the Somerset County Board of Commissioners.

Arcidi had been a corrections officer at the jail since 2017, holding positions of case manager, disciplinary hearings officer and special projects lieutenant, the Sheriff’s Office said in a February Facebook post announcing his promotion.

Arcidi posted $250 cash bail the day of his arrest and has pleaded not guilty to the charges, court records show.

He waived arraignment in August, according to court records, a move not unusual for misdemeanor-level offenses.

Arcidi’s attorney, Walter McKee, of the Augusta law firm McKee Morgan, maintained his client’s innocence.

“Cameron has denied that he ever engaged in this conduct at all. Full stop,” McKee said. “He is looking forward to a trial in this case.”

The criminal investigation into Arcidi’s alleged offenses began in July, according to an affidavit filed in court by Ronnie Blodgett, a Somerset County Sheriff’s Office detective assigned as an investigator for the Somerset County District Attorney’s Office.

At the same time, a separate internal affairs investigation had been opened by the Sheriff’s Office regarding Arcidi’s employment, Blodgett wrote in the affidavit.

Arcidi’s wife, also an employee at the Somerset County Jail, had been granted a protection order in June, the affidavit says.

The Morning Sentinel does not identify alleged victims of domestic violence without their consent.

The alleged victim provided Blodgett with several audio and video recordings of alleged abuse, according to the affidavit. Blodgett also interviewed two other witnesses who said they were aware of issues in the relationship between Arcidi and the alleged victim.

The most recent incident, at the time of the investigation, was May 13, two days before the alleged victim applied for the protection order, and was captured on a home video camera system, Blodgett wrote.

The alleged victim provided photos of injuries to her neck from that alleged incident, Blodgett wrote. Another jail employee told Blodgett that he observed the injuries and discussed with the alleged victim what had happened.

The date of that incident is the date listed in the criminal complaint for the domestic violence assault charge.

The domestic violence stalking charge alleges that Arcidi’s “course of conduct … would cause a reasonable person to suffer serious inconvenience or emotional distress” between Aug. 25, 2023, and May 14.

Some of Arcidi’s alleged conduct occurred at the jail, according to the affidavit. The alleged victim told Blodgett that Arcidi threatened to revoke her keycard access at the jail and took screenshots of him monitoring her on security cameras.

The alleged victim said Arcidi “controlled many aspects of her life like her working, telling her she should be subservient to him, that she needed to submit to him, that he would force her to engage in intercourse even after she had said no on multiple occasions,” Blodgett wrote in the conclusion of the affidavit. “(The alleged victim) said she would fear what Arcidi would do next and things got progressively worse as the relationship went on.”

In an interview with Blodgett, Arcidi denied there was any domestic violence and said he was frustrated with the lack of information provided to him about the separate internal affairs investigation. He said, at that point, he had been out of work for about a month.

Whether the criminal charges led to Arcidi’s termination is unclear.

Blodgett’s affidavit makes multiple references to the internal affairs investigation involving Arcidi, though it offers no further information about it and does not say if it was related to the domestic violence allegations.

Lancaster, the sheriff, said he could not comment further on the details of the internal affairs investigation because it is a personnel matter. Aspects of that investigation are ongoing, Lancaster said.

“Internal affairs investigations and criminal investigations can work parallel with each other,” Lancaster said.

The five county commissioners voted unanimously to terminate Arcidi at Lancaster’s recommendation, following a 14-minute executive session at their Sept. 4 meeting.

“The consensus of the Commissioners was that the employee was afforded the opportunity to be present for the executive session, and that the employee’s constitutional due process and other legal rights were honored in this process,” the meeting minutes say.

In response to a request under Maine’s Freedom of Access Act for a termination letter or agreement, Somerset County’s attorney, Peter Marchesi of the Waterville law firm Wheeler & Arey, pointed to the meeting minutes and said no such records exist.

The Morning Sentinel also requested any final written decisions pertaining to disciplinary actions taken against Arcidi during his employment at the jail. Marchesi wrote in his response to the request that there is no written decision pertaining to Arcidi’s termination, aside from Lancaster’s recommendation to the Board of Commissioners.

But Marchesi wrote that the county was declining to release that recommendation, since it may “prejudice the ongoing criminal proceeding, and is the subject of an open law enforcement investigation.”

Arcidi had one other disciplinary action taken against him during his employment in June 2018, county records show. He used a jail computer to access “MSN sites,” placing IT security at risk, according to an employee warning form. He was told by a supervisor to stop violating the county’s policy and to ask a supervisor for more tasks to perform when bored, according to the warning.

Arcidi is due back in court in Skowhegan Feb. 19 for a dispositional conference, according to court records.

In response to a motion filed by McKee, the defense attorney, Superior Court Chief Justice Robert E. Mullen ordered last week that prosecutors must refer to the alleged victim by her name or the “complainant” or “alleged victim,” rather than the “victim.”

Mullen also granted the defense’s motion to allow a subpoena for text messages and Facebook messages between Arcidi and the alleged victim. The alleged victim must appear in court with the messages by Dec. 30 for a judge to inspect them in chambers, Mullen’s order says.

McKee wrote in his motion that he was seeking the subpoena for all messages between the two since June 2022.

The messages could contain exculpatory evidence and may be relevant at trial, the motion says.