Details emerge in Lebanon man's groping arrest

Donald St. Jean (Courtesy photo)

LEBANON - The Lebanon man accused of groping a 14-year-old Dover, N.H., girl while partying at his house with her and her 16-year-old stepsister told The Lebanon Voice on Tuesday he didn’t really want to comment on the incident and his resulting arrest, but did say there “was a lot of miscommunication” and he was looking forward to his day in court.

Donald St. Jean, 61, of 62 Upper Middle Road, was arrested late Saturday by Maine State Police and charged with unlawful touching, possession of marijuana, serving to minors and possession of drug paraphernalia in connection with the incident, which began innocently enough with St. Jean’s meeting the 16-year-old on a dating site and continued with 10 days of chats by cellphone.

Maine State Police Sgt. Robert Nichols said when the call came in Saturday afternoon it was for two teenage girls who said they had been given a drink in Dover that had knocked them out and woken up in a locked house in Lebanon. The girls said they had escaped from the house, ran through the woods and were on a phone at Trains Quick Stop. They said the man who drugged them was sitting in his car down the road and they wanted help.

Nichols said after he arrived and interviewed them he noticed right away something was wrong, that their details didn’t make sense and were somewhat sketchy. Upon questioning them more closely, the two confessed they had made up the story and changed their narrative, Nichols said.

What police now believe happened is that the 16-year-old and St. Jean met on the dating website and began an online relationship which led to Saturday’s chain of events.

Nichols said it appears from the outset both the 16-year-old and St. Jean misrepresented their ages, St. Jean saying he mistakenly entered in 21 instead of 61 on the dating site and she saying she was 20 instead of 16.

Nichols said after 10 days of texting back and forth they agreed to meet, so St. Jean drove from Lebanon to Woodman Park in Dover, where unexpectedly, the 16-year-old has her 14-year-old stepsister with her. (Earlier reports had said she was 13, but she is actually 14.)

Evidently the three decided to go back to St. Jean’s neatly mowed Upper Middle Road mobile home, where they all then went three-wheeling before Nichols said St. Jean and the two girls then smoked pot and drank alcohol supplied by St. Jean.

Nichols said during the course of the afternoon the girls said St. Jean touched them through their clothing on their shoulders, back and legs, and at one point the 14-year-old said his hand brushed against her covered buttocks, leading to the unlawful sexual touching charge.

The girls said “none of that” and he didn’t do it again, Nichols said.

Soon afterward, they ask him to take them home to Dover and he says he can’t for a while, because he doesn’t drive after he’s stoned and had too much to drink, Nichols said, so they say they have to go outside and talk about what to do privately. He says OK, so they go outside, and then they run off, go to Trains and make the call to police.

For his part, standing in the doorway of his tidy home on Tuesday, St. Jean could only shake his head.

“The whole thing was a lot of miscommunication,” he said. “We’ll find out what happens in court.”

All of the charges are misdemeanors, Nichols said.

St. Jean’s arraignment in Springvale District Court is set for September.