Staff Writer

Three men were charged with felony assault after allegedly beating a man with baseball bats inside a Biddeford motel.

Biddeford Deputy Police Chief JoAnne Fisk said the assault appears to be racially motivated and has been forwarded to the Maine Attorney General’s Office for possible hate crime violations.

Police charged Dale M. Pinkham Jr., 20, of Old Orchard Beach, with disorderly conduct, carrying a concealed weapon (brass knuckles) and aggravated assault. Michael Gagne, 18, of Old Orchard Beach, was charged with aggravated assault. Darren Crawford, 20, of Biddeford, was charged with elevated aggravated assault.

Fisk said police who responded to a 911 call around 2 a.m. Saturday found a man with a serious head injury inside a room at the Sleepy Hollow Motel on Elm Street. The 27-year-old man was taken to Maine Medical Center for treatment of a head injury that appeared serious and was released Monday, she said.

Fisk said the person who called police reported someone attempted to break into the room through a window. As dispatchers stayed on the line, the caller reported she could hear people banging on the door of an adjacent room, yelling and breaking glass.

Fisk said four or five men used a baseball bat to smash a 6-foot picture window to gain entry into a hotel room. The occupants of the room – the male victim, a woman and a 4-year-old child – were asleep at the time.

“Once the window shattered waking them, the female occupant immediately ran to the small child who was covered in glass from the shattering window,” Fisk said in a prepared statement. The child was not injured.

The 27-year-old man ran to the door and was “jumped” by several men brandishing baseball bats and clubs, Fisk said. The men used the weapons to hit the victim in the head several times while yelling ethnic slurs and telling the man to “go back to Africa,” she said.

The attack appears to be racially motivated and related to a prior relationship the victim had with another woman, Fisk said.

Police did not identify the alleged victim or the other two people in the motel room. Biddeford detectives continue to investigate the incident and additional people may be charged, Fisk said.

Pinkham and Crawford remain in custody at York County Jail. The men were expected to be arraigned Tuesday.

Staff Writer Gillian Graham can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 213.