A Somerset County sheriff’s deputy who was ordered earlier this year to not possess weapons under Maine’s yellow flag law is on administrative leave without pay, the sheriff said Friday.

A judge issued an initial weapons restriction order to Deputy Stephen Armiger on Aug. 18, according to Maeghan Maloney, district attorney for Kennebec and Somerset counties.

The order was then extended on Oct. 10 for 90 days after a three-hour hearing, Maloney said.

The Bangor Daily News first reported on the order involving Armiger on Thursday.

Somerset County Sheriff Dale Lancaster confirmed Armiger’s leave status and described the situation as an ongoing personnel matter in an email Friday. He said the matter stems from an incident on Aug. 18, when sheriff’s deputies responded to a call at Armiger’s residence.

“When deputies arrived, it was determined that an outside agency should conduct the investigation,” Lancaster said. “The state police were notified.”

State troopers responded around 2 a.m. to the dispute at the residence in the Somerset County town of Detroit, according to Shannon Moss, public information officer for the Maine State Police. Moss referred further inquiries to the district attorney’s office, which received the case from the state police.

Maloney said her office has no pending criminal cases against Armiger.

The Somerset County Sheriff’s Office hired Armiger in March 2017, Lancaster said. 

Generally, in yellow flag cases — technically called extreme risk protection orders — a law enforcement officer makes the initial court filing, Maloney said. The court then notifies the district attorney’s office, which advocates on behalf of the state at the subsequent hearing.

State statute does not indicate whether extreme risk protection order proceedings and files are public or confidential, Judicial Branch spokesperson Barbara Cardone said in an email Friday. The courts make some general filings available for inspection, she said, although some records, such as mental health evaluations, are confidential under other laws.

Hearings in this kind of case are considered public as the law is currently written, Cardone said.

Maine’s unique yellow flag law, passed in 2019 with bipartisan support, dictates a process by which law enforcement can intervene when someone is believed to pose a risk to themselves or others. 

A law enforcement officer can take the person into protective custody and must have a medical provider complete a mental health assessment. If the assessment determines the person is a danger to themselves or others, authorities can ask a judge to restrict the person’s access to dangerous weapons and order them surrendered.

Someone subject to such an order is entitled to a hearing before a judge within 30 days of the judge issuing the initial restrictions. A judge can decide then whether to dissolve the initial restrictions and return the surrendered weapons or extend the order for up to one year.

The Maine Department of Public Safety reported in August that more than 1,000 orders had been issued across the state since the law went into effect.

Maine voters will weigh in Tuesday about whether they want to see a stricter version of the law that would be simpler to invoke, commonly known as a red flag law. 

Question 2 in the statewide referendum election asks voters whether they want to allow family or household members, in addition to law enforcement, to petition a court for an extreme risk protection order. The initiative would also eliminate the required mental evaluation for a judge to issue an order.

Gun safety advocates have long pushed for Maine to adopt a red flag law, versions of which exist in nearly two dozen states. The October 2023 Lewiston mass shooting, and subsequent criticism of how law enforcement failed to prevent it by using the yellow flag law to take shooter Robert Card’s weapons, reignited debate on the idea.

Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, has been vocal in her support of keeping the yellow flag measure. Opponents of the red flag initiative have said the existing yellow flag law is working and changes to it could infringe on Second Amendment rights.