HALLOWELL — At first, James Carey thought the man sprinting up his Academy Street driveway just past midnight June 13 was one of his son’s friends, coming to playfully scare him and walk away.

It was only when the man tried to wrestle 78-year-old Carey to the ground that his thoughts turned.

“I’m 78 and I’ve got friends dying of heart attacks and pancreatic cancer and all this stuff,” he said. “You never know how you’re gonna go. And I’m thinking, ‘Jesus, this is a way to go.'”

Carey had been suddenly attacked by an apparently drunken 24-year-old on one of Hallowell’s quietest streets late on a Friday night when police Chief Chris Giles intentionally has more officers available than usual.

Carey’s wife, Tina, frantically called 911, standing in the front doorway. Dickie Dow, Carey’s friend, was also in the driveway; the pair had been shuffling guitar equipment to Dow’s SUV in the driveway when the interaction began, following a night of practice for their two-man band. Dow’s wife, Nancy, waited inside the SUV.

The fight was mostly a blur, Carey said. He remembers getting off a glancing head kick, and then he remembers tumbling into his flower garden, where he injured his knee and got several cuts on his arms. Either of them could’ve been struck on the head by the rocks sticking out of the garden, but neither was.

One way or another, Carey pinned the man — who had still not said a single word since the altercation began — facedown against a piece of four-by-four landscaping timber. His Vietnam War training kicked in, he said. So did the adrenaline.

The man gave in, stopped struggling. Carey held his position. A Hallowell police officer tapped Carey on the shoulder.

“‘We’ll take him from here,'” Carey said the officer told him.

Hallowell police arrested the man and charged him with assault, disorderly conduct and criminal mischief.

Incidents like this are almost unheard of in this neighborhood, Giles said. But, he said, having two Hallowell officers on duty prevented the situation from escalating even further.

“We ordinarily have one officer, and some nights we don’t have any at that time of night,” Giles said. “If we were fully staffed, then that would typically be covered by one officer. I’ve been putting a second officer on on Friday and Saturdays, because there have been more and more issues that time of night.”

When the Hallowell Police Department does not have an officer on duty, Kennebec County Sheriff deputies and state police troopers fill in as part of countywide patrols. The two organizations split the county into six zones, with sheriff’s deputies covering four zones and state police covering two. Hallowell’s zone stretches as far west as Monmouth, meaning urgent calls like Carey’s could require longer response times.

Police staffing in Hallowell dwindled to just two officers last summer, which officials previously said was largely due to lack of competitive pay and poor conditions in the department’s office in the basement of Hallowell City Hall. That left dozens of hours every week unstaffed, even though Giles worked overtime and was often on call.

Staffing rebounded after union contract renegotiations. Now, Giles said, an average 20 hours per week are unstaffed and require sheriff and state police patrols. That gap would be closed by hiring one more full-time officer, he said.

Giles said he hopes the City Council supports fully funding a fifth officer position in budget deliberations — a position that officials froze during midyear spending cuts demanded by residents after the current budget led to a 20% property tax increase.

At-large Councilor Scott Cooper advocated to cut the position during Finance Committee deliberations, while Ward 2 Councilor Michael Frett supported funding the position at $62,649, marking one of the more substantial line-item disagreements in the committee. With no committee consensus reached, the issue is now up for discussion by the full council.

“Thankfully, we had two officers on and we were able to address it quickly,” Giles said. “But these are during hours where we would not have coverage if we lost this fifth officer position. If there was no coverage, you’re looking at a dramatic response time.”

Carey just wants answers — why this happened, and what can be done to prevent it from happening again. He said he could have just as easily ended up on the bottom of the tussle and his story could have ended very differently.