‘Too many deaths’: Retiring Maine police chief says stress took its toll

Citing the impacts of his job on his mental health, the police chief for Baileyville has announced his pending retirement.

Bob Fitzsimmons, who grew up in Baileyville and has been the town’s police chief since 2013, said on the department’s Facebook page that he plans to step down at the end of the year. The rigors and challenges of the job have built up over the years and it is time for someone else to take on his responsibilities, he said.

“It has been a rough 5 years in Woodland for me,” Fitzsimmons said, referring to the town’s informal name. “Too many deaths, too much ugliness to deal with.”

While many police officers and other first responders struggle with mental health challenges associated with their jobs, it’s far less common for them to openly share those struggles on platforms such as Facebook.

Fitzsimmons said that in his time as Baileyville’s police chief, he has either found or been with 60 people when they died. He said he has received counseling and treatment, and has been diagnosed with anxiety and depression.

“There will always be another child, another person I have watched grow up, and another person that watched over me. Friends, or friends of friends. It’s never going to stop,” he said.

Fitzsimmons, 60, is known for his posts on the department’s Facebook page, where he would seek volunteers to help out residents or describe his interactions with local children. Often the posts reflected his wry sense of humor, but they also described the real struggles that local people were going through.

He said he has been granted “every courtesy” by the town manager and the council, and that he considers it a privilege to have served as the police chief, and before that with the law enforcement departments in Calais and Pleasant Point. But he said he plans to spend more time with his wife and to work on his mental health so he can enjoy retirement.

“The PD is in great hands now, I just hope I left Woodland just a bit better than it was,” he wrote.

Fitzsimmons encouraged anyone who has been struggling with their mental health to be open about it and to get help.

“Mental health needs to be treated like any other illness or injury,” he wrote. “It’s ok to talk about it, it’s ok to seek treatment without shame, it’s all gonna be ok.”