It's not entirely clear what led Frederick Ladd Wintle, a Republican state legislator from Maine, to believe that a local news photographer might also be a drug dealer who's somehow responsible for killing babies. But it appears that he was wrong, and also wrong about some other things.

According to the photographer, Wintle approached him "in a deranged manner" outside a Dunkin Donuts and started talking about a baby who recently died at a local homeless shelter. Apparently Wintle was looking for the mother's "drug dealer," even though such person might not actually exist. Then Wintle pulled out his 22-caliber handgun and aimed it at the photographer's mid-section, either because he was using it to point out some powdered sugar on the man's shirt or, as one report states, he thought the photographer was the mother's drug dealer. Mistake!

Even if the photographer was a drug dealer, eating donuts do not turn you into a police officer—that's an urban legend, based on stereotypes. Now Wintle faces charges of criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon and carrying a concealed weapon, and has lost his electronic badge privileges. He might even be barred from the House.

This wasn't Wintle's only run-in with trouble this week: He'd also been kicked out of a hotel after trying to fight another guest. And people at the House say he's been acting pretty weird lately, though nobody wants to provide any details. Oh well, at least he can still smile.

[WLBZ, Think Progress]