June 1985, My daughter, Coralee, who lives in Massachusetts, called me after the charges against Roger Johnson, William Myers and R. Sargent were dismissed to ask if I wanted to go to Bar Harbor with her for a couple of days. She knew how devastated I was over the way the state had bungled Mike's murder. She thought if I got away for a couple of days it would take my mind off everything at least for a while.
The weather was beautiful and we had a great time. When we arrived home my youngest son, Shawn, came running out to the car and said that a man had called to speak with me about Michael’s murder and had left his phone number and wanted me to call him. I immediately called the phone number and the person answering the phone identified himself as Everett Cross. He said he had been watching and reading the news about my son's murder and that years previous he had been acquainted with the Sargent family.
He went on to say that early in the morning of February 18, 1981 his young son was babysitting for someone at the Phillips Lake and he was waiting up for him. While he waited he was listening to his police scanner when he heard a woman report a fire at Phillips Lake and she said she had seen two men walking one man into the woods and then she heard a gunshot. She said the person said, “watch for a red Pinto heading to Brewer.” He said he didn’t know where the call was sent whether it was the Brewer Police, Bangor Police, Maine State Police or Sheriff’s Department. He said the reason it caught his attention was because the fire was at the lake and he was concerned about his young son.
During our conversation I told him about the drug bust happening at approximately 3 hours before Mike’s murder and that the DEA had used a drug dealer from Aroostook County to set up the bust. He said, “That was a sting.” The news had called it a raid, a drug arrest or a drug bust, but Mr. Cross finally put it in perspective for me. It was a DEA sting.
I had not heard anything about a red Pinto at that time. (June 1985) But After reading A. Jay Higgins’ Oct. 1986 articles concerning the Penobscot law officials conducting their DEA busts with dangerous criminals, I drove to Aroostook County Superior Court (120 miles north) in Houlton, Maine and requested any and all documents on Percy Cote. The criminal the DEA used the night Mike was murdered. The information I received in Aroostook County prompted me to go the Penobscot County Superior Courthouse in Bangor as soon as I arrived home to request any and all copies of court transcripts on Percy Cote, Percy Sargent and David Dupray's drug trafficking trials in 1981. I found some very interesting information in the court transcripts concerning the Maine DEA’s undercover drug sting the night Mike was murdered. I found documents that said Percy Sargent was driving a red Pinto late hours of February 17, 1981 when he met up with drug agents and he was arrested while selling drugs to them. The DEA agents impounded the red Pinto and they were driving it when it was seen at the arson/murder scene. The car belonged to Paul Pollard. He had rented the car and went to the to the Bangor PD on the 24th of February 1981 to try retrieve it. But he was arrested by Bangor Police Lt. Roger Bryce for an old forgery warrant. This was covered up! I believe that the DEA agents intending to arrest Mike after the drug sting arrived at the cottage to find it on fire and Pollard saw them? Pollard was still there when Fire Chief Herrin arrived at the arson/murder scene. Herrin saw him fleeing toward the woods. The State Police and Attorney General's Office protected Paul Pollard and wiped out his crimes? I couldn't find Pollard after I learned he was the only person with Mike, and the police wouldn't tell me where he was. They hid him. Was he told to keep his mouth shut and they would protect him? The red Pinto the DEA agents were driving was seen leaving the arson/murder scene and Mike was left for 6 days under a pile of fire rubble for animals to disturb as Fire Inspector Ricker said happened.