A 50-year-old French citizen who was arrested in Aroostook County earlier this year for entering the country illegally was sentenced Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Bangor.

Judge John A. Woodcock, Jr. sentenced Philippe Maurice to time served (113 days) and to one year of supervised release for entering the United States after having been removed and deported.

Court documents reveal that on May 17, U.S. Border Patrol agents found Maurice riding a bike on a dirt logging road in Portage, Maine. The defendant claimed he was a U.S. citizen. When an agent asked him for proof of citizenship, he produced a French driver’s license.

The defendant then acknowledged that he was a citizen of France, that friends had dropped him off in Canada near the border, and that he had entered the U. S. illegally by riding a bike through the closed St. Pamphile Port of Entry.

Immigration records showed that the defendant had been removed from the United States in 2015.

Maurice pleaded guilty on June 19, according to acting U. S. Attorney Richard W. Murphy.

The case was investigated by the U.S. Border Patrol.

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