Chris Finley stood staring at the carnage. He closed the door and wouldn’t return until the next day when a friend helped him clean up the mess.

A week earlier, police detectives had taken him back to his apartment the day after the assault. His assailants had taken his keys, along with his wallet, debit and credit cards, cell phone and laptop computer. The detectives had taken photos of the crime scene, documenting the evidence for possible use at trial.

Finley had waited outside his apartment in the hallway, as instructed, until the detectives were done with their work. They let him in afterward so he could pack up a few belongings and leave town.

One of Finley’s alleged assailants, Frank Matott, had broken Finley’s jaw and nose, given him a mild concussion and ripped the corner of his eye, a gash that took 6 stitches to close.

Matott’s girlfriend, Lynne Montoya, was frying an egg in Finley’s kitchen during the beating. She left her place at the stove briefly to join in the assault, Finley said.

He had buzzed Montoya through the locked door in the lobby because she’d said she wanted to talk to him. They knew each other from when Finley had stayed at her place for a short time. He didn’t know Matott was with her downstairs.

When the couple finished hitting Finley, they ordered him to take a shower, get cleaned up and go with them to a Main Street ATM to get money for them from his account, he said.

Finley did as instructed. But there was no money in his account. When the machine failed to spit out any cash, Matott took Finley into a nearby 7-11 store where the man tried without success to buy beer and cigarettes with Finley’s card.

He was ordered to accompany the couple to an apartment building on Pine Street. There, Finley had the first lucky break of the night. Police had been dispatched to the same building on an unrelated call.

Finley was still bleeding from his head wounds. One of the officers asked him to be treated by EMTs. He was put in an ambulance and taken to the hospital.

He had been afraid at first to report his assault and robbery because Matott and Montoya had threatened to kill him if he told anybody what they’d done.

Finley was sitting in the waiting room at the district attorney’s office in the Androscoggin County Courthouse waiting to testify against Matott. Assistant District Attorney Nicholas Worden called Finley into his office and told him the judge had dropped the felony charge against Matott.

Montoya had accepted a plea agreement with a sentence capped at 15 months on all charges in exchange for testifying against her boyfriend at trial. She and Matott each had faced a felony robbery charge, which, alone, was punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

That was before the judge dropped the robbery charge against Matott. Prosecutors believed Montoya should be given a chance to withdraw her plea in light of the evidence glitch. She did that and later pleaded to a misdemeanor assault charge.

Now the couple is back on the streets, having been sentenced to time served on misdemeanor assault charges. Finley is afraid they’ll seek revenge for having told police.

“I was pissed,” when Worden told him how the robbery cases had unraveled, Finley said.

“This was not just a simple assault and robbery,” he said. “There was a lot of physical damage done.”

Matott escaped a possible decade behind bars and faces only a maximum of 364 days in jail.

“That just doesn’t sit well with me,” Finley said.

He’s afraid to go outside, even though he has a restraining order against Matott and Montoya.

“It’s pretty much open season,” he said.

“If I knew exactly where to place the blame, I would sue that person. But since I don’t, I have no choice but to sue the whole department.”

cwilliams@sunjournal.com

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