A town where buying gas can get you in big trouble

Residents of border village furious
at U.S. treatment of local forestry worker

By CAMPBELL CLARK

Tuesday, November 12, 2002 Print Edition, Page A7

POHÉNÉGAMOOK, QUE. -- Bill Desbiens filled up at the Gaz-bar Ouellette yesterday, violating U.S. law by buying a tank of gas without first reporting to customs.

That same act ending up costing Michel Jalbert a month in prison, with perhaps months more to come. But the U.S. customs post just outside Pohénégamook, Que., had closed 30 minutes earlier, at 1 p.m., so Mr. Desbiens, 56, said he "had no choice.

"What people have to understand is that this here is like Canada," he said standing beside the gas pumps on U.S. land. "Theoretically, it isn't Canada. But logically, it is."

That seems obvious to people in Pohénégamook, the little town across the border from the northernmost point in Maine. The Quebec-Maine border cuts straight alongside a local street, putting houses close to the street in Canada, and those set back a few metres from it in the U.S. -- with some split between the two. The gas station's access is in Canada. The pumps are in the U.S.

That is why most here are outraged that Mr. Jalbert, a 32-year-old forestry worker, was arrested Oct. 11 for failing to report to U.S. customs a kilometre up the road before buying gas, and that he remains in jail a month later: The gas station is surrounded by woods and its driveway leads back to Canada.

Although Mr. Jalbert had a minor criminal record dating from when he was 19, and was carrying a hunting rifle in his truck -- two reasons U.S. prosecutors cite for pressing the case -- he had nowhere to go from the gas station but back to Canada, posing little danger to the U.S.

And Pohénégamook is not an ordinary border crossing, used for visiting Maine towns, but rather a customs post intended for logging trucks. Only a private logging route, closed by barrier, leads into Maine. It does not run near the gas station, but starts beside the U.S. customs post, and winds through 100 kilometres of remote forest before reaching any village.

To drive to U.S. towns, locals drive 75 kilometres in the other direction to cross the border at Clair, N.B.

"There's no back door here," said Jocelyn Gagné, one of the four "pure American" citizens of Estcourt Station, Maine, as the American slice of Pohénégamook is officially known. "There is absolutely nothing here but woods."

Mr. Gagné, a francophone, works at the gas station on the U.S. side, but he cannot even walk to a street without entering Canada. His family's house is a few metres behind the Canadian customs post, separated by a waist-high fence. His neighbour Edmond Lévesque, has a dining room in Canada and a bedroom in the U.S. And Mr. Gagné is worried about the new "Berlin Wall" attitude at the border.

Border squabbles are part of local history, however. In 1829 after arguing about where the official border rested, Canada and the U.S. asked the King of the Netherlands to arbitrate. The U.S. rejected his decision, but finally settled for a treaty in 1842.

Whether Pohénégamook's Rang de la Frontière, or Border Street, came to be astride the line when a surveyor's mistake was corrected in this century, or when houses were inadvertently moved onto the border to make way for rail tracks, is a matter of local dispute.

Reporting to the U.S. customs post before buying gas is a relatively minor formality -- but the border post, down the road where there is only a lumber mill, closes early in the afternoon. Guy Leblanc, the local Canada Customs officer, said some do not even know it is there.

For years, Canadians haven't bothered, and U.S. customs hasn't cared. A drive-in theatre operated next to the gas station for many years, showing films to locals after the U.S. border office had closed.

The district director of the U.S. Customs Service even put an exception for gas station customers in writing in 1990.

But on Oct. 11, a Border Patrol officer was waiting in his jeep in the woods behind the station, an hour after the U.S. customs post had closed. Several others bought gas, including at least four who had hunting rifles in their trucks, according to Mr. Leblanc, before Mr. Jalbert, wearing an orange hunting jacket, was arrested.

"It's a trap, pure and simple," said Chantale Chouinard, Mr. Jalbert's common-law wife. "Maybe he was wrong to bring a gun to the other side. But let him pay a fine and come home." Instead, a confused and depressed Mr. Jalbert was moved from jail to jail in Maine, not even knowing he was allowed to call home, because he does not speak any English and could not communicate.

U.S. federal prosecutors did not look lightly on his hunting rifle and his criminal record -- a $200 fine for breaking windows and being in possession of stolen property dating from when he was 19. He has been indicted on one charge of illegal entry to the U.S. and two weapons charges.

His lawyer, John Haddow, said he will seek to obtain Mr. Jalbert's release on bail tomorrow, but he will probably be required to stay in the U.S. until his trial is held.