MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT Reporter of Decisions

Decision: 2014 ME 18

Docket: Yor-13-117

Argued: December 17, 2013

Decided: February 11, 2014

Panel: SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, LEVY, SILVER, MEAD, and GORMAN, JJ.

ELLEN J. CLARK

v.

JOHN BRIAN MCLANE

GORMAN, J.

[¶1] John Brian McLane appeals from an order for protection from abuse 

entered in the District Court (Biddeford, Foster, J.) on Ellen J. Clark’s complaint. 

McLane contends that there is insufficient evidence as a matter of law to support 

the court’s finding that he abused Clark within the meaning of the protection from 

abuse statute, 19-A M.R.S. §§ 4001-4014 (2012).

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 We affirm the judgment.

I. BACKGROUND

[¶2] The following facts are undisputed.2 Clark and McLane engaged in an 

intimate relationship for several months from 2011 to 2012. On January 13, 2013, 

 1

 Portions of the protection from abuse statute have since been amended, see P.L. 2013, ch. 109, 

§§ 1-2 (effective Oct. 9, 2013); P.L. 2013, ch. 424, § B-8 (effective July 16, 2013), but those amendments 

do not affect this appeal.

2

 The court made some findings of fact, which are supported by competent evidence. Because 

McLane did not request further findings of fact, we assume that the court found the additional facts set 

forth here that are necessary to support its judgment. See Ellis v. Ellis, 2008 ME 191, ¶ 19, 962 A.2d 328. 
2

after their relationship had ended and after Clark had notified McLane’s wife of the 

affair, McLane sent an email to Clark containing a litany of insulting and 

derogatory remarks. He informed her that he had created a website in her name on 

which he planned to post nude photographs of her, and that he was also setting up 

accounts with three major search engines so that any search of her name would 

first yield a result for the website that he had created. In addition, he told her that 

he was creating an account on a video-sharing website in her name, that he would 

be sharing the websites with her friends, that he had already gathered eighteen or 

more email addresses from her work colleagues to share the websites with them, 

and that potential employers would see the websites as well. McLane further 

stated that “[g]uys will have your cell number, as well as your work number to get 

a hold of you [sic] and ask you out.” McLane provided a link to a website in her 

name that he had already set up; it consisted of a single page stating, “The naked 

pictures of EJ Clark will be coming soon.... along with her cell phone number and 

her work number for you to call and arrange a date.”

[¶3] In January of 2013, Clark instituted protection from abuse proceedings 

against McLane. The court (Janelle, J.) issued a temporary protection order. 

During the testimonial hearing held in February of 2013, Clark testified that she 

 In any event, the parties do not dispute the underlying facts; McLane instead argues that those facts are 

insufficient as a matter of law to support the judgment. 
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believed that McLane would follow through with his stated intentions, and that his

actions would adversely affect her career and her employability. She testified that 

McLane’s threat to contact her work colleagues was an attempt to affect her 

current employment by causing her to avoid work and would also affect her ability 

to find other employment. The court (Foster, J.) determined that McLane’s 

conduct constituted abuse and granted Clark a protection order for a period of one 

year prohibiting McLane from having contact with Clark, and also ordering 

McLane to “immediately disable any efforts/sites designed to disseminate 

information about plaintiff to others” and “not undertake further efforts to do so.”

McLane appeals.

II. DISCUSSION

[¶4] The protection from abuse statute authorizes the court to issue a 

protection order upon proof, by a preponderance of the evidence, that the plaintiff 

and defendant are “family or household members” or “dating partners” and that the 

defendant committed some form of “abuse” against the plaintiff. 19-A M.R.S. 

§§ 4002(1), (3-A), (4), 4005(1), 4006(1), 4007(1). There is no dispute that 

McLane and Clark qualify as “[d]ating partners” within the meaning of 

19-A M.R.S. § 4002(3-A) and McLane concedes that he sent the email that is the 

subject of this action. What remains for our decision is whether McLane’s actions 
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and statements meet the definition of “abuse” in the statute as a matter of law. See

19-A M.R.S. § 4002(1).

[¶5] We conduct a de novo interpretation of the plain language of the statute 

to determine its unambiguous meaning. L’Heureux v. Michaud, 2007 ME 149, 

¶¶ 5, 7, 938 A.2d 801. The statute defines “abuse” as follows:

1. Abuse. “Abuse” means the occurrence of the following acts 

between family or household members or dating partners or by a 

family or household member or dating partner upon a minor child of a 

family or household member or dating partner: 

A. Attempting to cause or causing bodily injury or offensive 

physical contact, including sexual assaults under Title 17-A, 

chapter 11, except that contact as described in Title 17-A, 

section 106, subsection 1 is excluded from this definition; 

B. Attempting to place or placing another in fear of bodily 

injury through any course of conduct, including, but not limited 

to, threatening, harassing or tormenting behavior; 

C. Compelling a person by force, threat of force or intimidation 

to engage in conduct from which the person has a right or 

privilege to abstain or to abstain from conduct in which the 

person has a right to engage;

D. Knowingly restricting substantially the movements of 

another person without that person’s consent or other lawful 

authority by: 

(1) Removing that person from that person’s residence, 

place of business or school;

(2) Moving that person a substantial distance from the 

vicinity where that person was found; or
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(3) Confining that person for a substantial period either in 

the place where the restriction commences or in a place 

to which that person has been moved; 

E. Communicating to a person a threat to commit, or to cause to 

be committed, a crime of violence dangerous to human life 

against the person to whom the communication is made or 

another, and the natural and probable consequence of the threat, 

whether or not that consequence in fact occurs, is to place the 

person to whom the threat is communicated, or the person 

against whom the threat is made, in reasonable fear that the 

crime will be committed; or 

F. Repeatedly and without reasonable cause: 

(1) Following the plaintiff; or

(2) Being at or in the vicinity of the plaintiff’s home, 

school, business or place of employment.

19-A M.R.S. § 4002(1). In interpreting section 4002, the protection statute also 

requires us to “liberally construe and apply this chapter to promote [its] underlying 

purposes,” including to “recognize domestic abuse as a serious crime against the 

individual and society, producing an unhealthy and dangerous family environment, 

resulting in a pattern of escalating abuse, including violence, that frequently 

culminates in intrafamily homicide and creating an atmosphere that is not 

conducive to healthy childhood development.” 19-A M.R.S. § 4001(1).

[¶6] Abuse comes in many forms, and neither the plain language of the 

protection statute nor our prior interpretations of it requires evidence of physical 

harm or the risk of physical harm to sustain a finding of abuse. See 19-A M.R.S. 
6

§ 4002(1); Cole v. Cole, 2008 ME 4, ¶ 4, 940 A.2d 194. Rather, contrary to 

McLane’s contention, we agree with the District Court that, at a minimum, the 

definition of “abuse” in section 4002(1)(C) encompasses McLane’s behavior. 

Subsection 1(C) proscribes acts that, through intimidation, compel the victim to 

abstain from conduct in which the victim has a right to engage. One type of 

conduct in which Clark had a right to engage was going to work. Clark testified 

that McLane’s threats, which focused in large part on Clark’s work colleagues and 

future employment prospects, were an attempt to humiliate her and to cause her to 

avoid going to work. Given the liberal construction of the statute that the 

Legislature directs us to apply, the evidence Clark presented is sufficient as a 

matter of law to support the court’s finding of abuse.

The entry is:

Judgment affirmed. 

On the briefs:

Scott Giese, Esq., Biddeford, for appellant John Brian McLane

R. July Simpson, Esq., Champagne & Simpson, LLC, 

Biddeford, for appellee Ellen J. Clark

Christopher Northrop, Esq., Sara Murphy, Student Attorney, 

and Caitlin Ross, Student Attorney, Cumberland Legal Aid 

Clinic, Portland, for amicus curiae Cumberland Legal Aid 

Clinic
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James M. Amendolara, Esq., Sanford, for amici curiae National 

Association of Women Lawyers and Sarah Buel

Erin M. Lundberg, Esq., and Lucia Chomeau Hunt, Esq., Pine 

Tree Legal Assistance, Inc., Portland, for amicus curiae Pine 

Tree Legal Assistance, Inc. 

Tamar Perfit Mathieu, Esq., Penquis Law Project, Bangor, for 

amicus curiae Maine Coalition Against Sexual Assault

At oral argument:

Scott Giese, Esq., for appellant John Brian McLane

R. July Simpson, Esq., for appellee Ellen J. Clark

Biddeford District Court docket number PA-2013-17 

FOR CLERK REFERENCE ONLY