SKOWHEGAN — The owner of a shuttered medical cannabis shop in Madison is facing additional charges for a scuffle with court officers that already landed him in jail for 14 days.

Prosecutors on Friday charged Daniel Safranec, 40, of Madison, with one Class C count of assault on an officer, one Class D count of refusing to submit to arrest, one Class D count of criminal mischief and one Class E count of violation of condition of release, according to court records.

Safranec made an initial court appearance on those charges in Skowhegan Friday and was ordered held without bail, although that is subject to future review, court records show. As one of the counts is felony-level, the case must first go to a grand jury before Safranec is asked to enter pleas. He is due back in court in Skowhegan March 18.

Safranec is also being held without bail on one Class B count of unlawful trafficking in scheduled drugs and one Class B count of marijuana cultivation, the charges for which he was in court Wednesday when Chief Judge Brent Davis of the Maine District Court found him in contempt.

Safranec had posted $10,000 cash bail on those charges July 31, court records show, which was the day after police raided his Madison shop and home and arrested him. On Friday, a judge denied a request from the district attorney’s office to revoke bail in that case and set the matter for a hearing on Nov. 24 in Skowhegan.

For Safranec’s courtroom outburst last week, Davis ordered him Thursday to serve 14 days in the Somerset County Jail.

Safranec was at the Skowhegan District Court the day before for his initial court appearance on the marijuana trafficking and cultivation charges. The matter was scheduled during the morning docket along with dozens of other arraignments in criminal cases.

Davis informed him of the charges and appointed him an attorney, the judge wrote in his contempt order. Safranec interrupted several times, saying he wanted the charges dismissed and a speedy trial.

Davis warned Safranec to stop interrupting and eventually held him in contempt when he did not stop, the order says. 

When judicial marshals went to take Safranec into custody, he told them they would have to beat him with a bat and used profanity on two occasions, Davis wrote. Safranec knocked down one of the marshals during the altercation.

Detective Jeremy Leal, a Somerset County Sheriff’s Office investigator assigned to the district attorney’s office, wrote in two affidavits that he came to the courtroom after hearing the commotion from his office next door.

Leal wrote he assisted Deputy Judicial Marshal Nick Rotondi, who he saw was on his back under Safranec. Video footage later obtained showed that Safranec had his hand and wrists across Rotondi’s neck and was applying pressure to keep him from standing up, Leal wrote. Rotondi later reported it was difficult for him to breathe at that point in the altercation.

After eventually placing Safranec in handcuffs with the assistance of another marshal, Leal and Rotondi had to pick up Safranec to move him to a holding cell, as Safranec was refusing to walk on his own, Leal wrote.

Safranec, who after falling into a railing agreed to walk on his own, continued to yell that his rights were being violated and threatened to disobey court rulings against him, Leal wrote.

Rotondi, an employee of the Sheriff’s Office, had minor injuries from the affray but has since been back to work. The commotion damaged Rotondi’s communications equipment and his flashlight, as well as at least one of the courtroom gallery seats, according to Leal’s affidavits.

Leal initially charged Safranec only with refusing to submit to arrest, but on Friday filed a supplemental affidavit supporting prosecutors’ further charges.

After hearing what he called Safranec’s “somewhat genuine” apology at the security-heavy contempt hearing Thursday, Davis called Safranec’s behavior unacceptable, the worst he has ever seen from the bench. 

“The ongoing contemptuous conduct was clearly done for the purpose of disturbing or hindering the court process, and very clearly showed outward disrespect for the court and the court’s authority,” Davis concluded in his written order. “It was a contrived breach of decorum that intended to test the court’s authority, and the court cannot tolerate that breach of decorum without a response.” 

Under Maine rules of court procedure, a judge may order someone found in contempt for conduct that occurs in the presence of a judge to serve up to 30 days in jail or pay up to $5,000 fine. The defendant must be heard before a judge may issue such a sanction. Such contempt is not prosecuted by an attorney; a judge simply certifies that he or she witnessed the conduct.

Attorney Julia Lodsin, appointed to represent Safranec for the contempt proceedings, questioned whether Davis had the authority, from a procedural standpoint, to hold Safranec in jail overnight before holding the hearing.

She also noted that, although Safranec’s conduct was inexcusable, it stemmed from his frustration with his criminal case and lack of understanding about the judicial system.

Safranec had been eagerly awaiting his day in court since his July arrest, Lodsin said, and may not have fully understood his initial appearance Wednesday was unlikely to be the day the case would be resolved. Safranec has not yet been asked to enter a plea, as the charges are felony-level and prosecutors have not yet obtained an indictment from a grand jury.

The charges against Safranec stem from July 30, when the Somerset County Sheriff’s Office executed two search warrants — one at Safranec’s home on East Madison Road and the other at his business, Simple Twist Cannabis Co. on Lakewood Road.

Investigators seized more than 2,120 pounds of processed marijuana, 159 flowering marijuana plants, a large amount of marijuana-laced products, more than $1,800 in cash and various records, Sheriff Dale Lancaster said at the time.

About a week before, Madison town officials were successful in getting a judge to order Simple Twist Cannabis to close for its lack of license. Lancaster, however, said at the time that the timing of the busts had nothing to do with that.

In that case, a civil matter, Judge Erika Bristol issued an order following a hearing July 24 that Simple Twist Cannabis and Safranec cease all distribution, sale and transfer of cannabis products until he obtains proper licenses from the state Office of Cannabis Policy and the town of Madison, court records show.

Bristol also ordered Safranec and his company to pay the town’s legal fees of $2,932.09 and civil penalties totaling $29,100. In late August, Madison’s town attorney filed an affidavit indicating no payments had been made. The court issued a writ of execution in late September, and there have been no further court filings since.

Bristol found that Safranec lacked a proper caregiver registry identification card from OCP, which therefore put him out of compliance with a town ordinance on medical cannabis establishments.

Safranec’s card expired July 9, 2024, and regulators did not grant his renewal applications because there was missing information, according to OCP records obtained through Maine’s Freedom of Access Act. The office officially denied his application to renew May 30, and upheld that decision in August after Safranec appealed it.

Safranec, who previously held the caregiver registry identification card and operated his business for several years, argued that he lacked it because of procedural changes at OCP and paperwork issues.

In 2015, Safranec was sentenced to 12 months in prison for a federal marijuana manufacturing conviction in the Western District of New York.