SKOWHEGAN — A judge dismissed the most serious charges Monday against a Madison man who fled police and hid 40 feet up a tree earlier this year, while criticizing police and prosecutors in his ruling for their failure to turn over evidence to the man’s attorney.

Superior Court Chief Justice Robert E. Mullen’s order dismissing two Class A counts of aggravated trafficking in scheduled drugs paved the way for Noah Weeks, 41, to plead guilty to lesser charges stemming from the March 18 high-speed chase in Madison.

At the Somerset County Superior Court in Skowhegan, Weeks was set to go on trial for remaining felony-level counts of possession of a firearm by a prohibited person and eluding an officer and misdemeanor-level counts of driving to endanger, criminal speed, refusing to submit to arrest and violation of condition of release.

Instead, through a plea agreement, prosecutors dismissed the firearm charge, and Weeks pleaded guilty to the other five counts.

Per the deal, Weeks was sentenced to three years in prison, ordered to pay a $575 fine and his driver’s license, already suspended, was taken away for 30 days. Weeks has a slew of unrelated charges pending in Penobscot County, jail records show, and he was taken back into custody following the hearing.

Mullen said the plea agreement came about after he ruled Friday on several motions from Weeks’ court-appointed attorney, Daniel Lawson of the Capital Region Public Defenders Office.

Lawson, who replaced Weeks’ previously appointed attorney John O’Donnell in August, had requested that prosecutors turn over evidence, as they should have automatically done, court records show.

Mullen noted in his order that Lawson had not received the police affidavit in support of probable cause for a search warrant until Oct. 15 docket call, which is basically a scheduling hearing and one of the last steps in a criminal case before jury selection.

Lawson further requested DNA test results, which prosecutors sent him, and drug test results, which prosecutors said did not exist, according to court records.

As for Lawson’s request for Weeks’ seized cellphone and related records, Assistant District Attorney Jonathan Provisor told Mullen at a hearing Thursday the Somerset County Sheriff’s Office never responded to his communications requesting them, Mullen wrote in his order.

Provisor also “lamely” could only provide a vague answer about where the cellphone was currently located, Mullen wrote. He further told Mullen, “the State cannot control the responses from what we get from law enforcement.”

Lawson argued the records, which he was entitled to receive anyway, may have supported a defense theory that Weeks did not actually live at or traffic drugs from a residence on Oak Street in Madison. The residence and Weeks’ vehicle were the subjects of the search warrant investigators were executing when the lengthy chase began.

“It is difficult for the undersigned to fathom why (the Sheriff’s Office) would simply ignore the request from the (assistant district attorney) for the cellphone and its contents,” Mullen wrote. 

“This situation demonstrates, at best, either a serious lack of communication between law enforcement and the District Attorney’s Office, or, at worst, a refusal on the part of (the Sheriff’s Office) to ‘play by the rules’ and provide clearly admissible evidence to defense counsel, whether or not the evidence would be exculpatory, inculpatory, or a combination of both,” his order continued. “Regardless of the possible explanations, none are acceptable to the undersigned.”

Mullen questioned whether the district attorney’s office did its due diligence as well.

“Also concerning is why (Provisor) did not provide details about how many times he called or emailed or contacted (the Sheriff’s Office),” Mullen wrote in a footnote. “Perhaps he requested the evidence once, then did not follow up, perhaps there were multiple attempts to obtain the evidence. The Court simply doesn’t know.”

Mullen found “the only effective, realistic sanction,” for the discovery violation, without knowing the details of the cellphone evidence, was the dismissal of the two drug trafficking counts that relied upon the cellphone.

He dismissed the charges with prejudice, meaning prosecutors cannot pursue them again.

Somerset County Sheriff Dale Lancaster pushed back at the characterization that his office refused to turn over the cellphone evidence or ignored requests for it.

Lancaster said he reviewed the case personally Monday, speaking with the detectives involved and reviewing emails. His office could not locate any formal request from Provisor for additional information.

He said his staff takes pride in submitting complete investigations and maintaining good relationships with prosecutors.

“Deputies and staff do everything in their power to ensure that evidence is provided to the District Attorney’s Office in a manner that conforms with the rules of criminal procedure,” Lancaster said via email. “It has been my experience that the Sheriff’s Office and the District Attorney’s Office (are) continually communicating regarding submitted cases.”

Mullen’s ruling marks the latest example of District Attorney Maeghan Maloney’s office, which covers Kennebec and Somerset counties, facing a rebuke for its handling of discovery, the legal term for all evidence and other information related to a case.

In another recent Somerset County drug trafficking case, Judge Erika Bristol found prosecutors acted in “bad faith” in not turning over evidence to a defense attorney, an oversight Maloney blamed on high caseloads, the Maine Monitor reported.

And, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court recently heard oral arguments in a Kennebec County case in which Maloney’s office violated discovery rules for its failure to hand over an Augusta police officer’s disciplinary records. Maloney attributed that error to a simple mistake of not including the right person on an email chain.

In response to a separate motion in Weeks’ case, Mullen had also ordered prosecutors to disclose the identity of a confidential “concerned citizen” if they wanted to introduce the person’s testimony that they saw Weeks carrying a firearm into the Madison residence.

In doing so, Mullen also criticized prosecutors, as the “concerned citizen” failed to appear for an in-chambers hearing on the motion. Mullen wrote that on Thursday he gave the person two hours to show up to the courthouse after informing attorneys of his request, and despite prosecutors saying the person was on the way, the person never arrived.

Weeks was arrested March 18 and has since been held in jail on $10,000 cash bail.

Detective David Cole of the Somerset County Sheriff’s Office was executing a search warrant that morning at what he believed was Weeks’ Madison residence, Provisor said in court Monday.

Cole spotted Weeks driving a vehicle, which was also covered by the search warrant, on Ward Hill Road and began to pursue the vehicle, Provisor said. A high-speed chase reaching speeds of more than 100 mph ensued, and Weeks eventually pulled into a driveway off Ward Hill Road, where the vehicle became stuck in mud.

Weeks then fled on foot into the woods. Investigators later used a police dog to track Weeks, who was found to have climbed about 40 feet up into a tree. Police said he stayed in the tree for about an hour before coming down.

Weeks had multiple active arrest warrants, too, police said.

Investigators seized more than 23 grams of fentanyl from the vehicle and the house, the Sheriff’s Office said previously. They also seized multiple firearms and several other drug-related items.

Another person found at the Oak Street residence that day was issued a summons in October for the same charges of aggravated trafficking in scheduled drugs that Weeks faced. The man’s initial court appearance in Skowhegan is in December, according to Mullen’s order.