RUMFORD — Five days before Christmas, two town police officers received early presents by being promoted.

They also had the required experience to be shift supervisors, Chief Stacy Carter said on Wednesday afternoon.

On Dec. 20, Carter promoted Cpl. Douglas Maifeld to sergeant and Patrolman Lawrence Winson to corporal.

“We had the promotion because Sgt. Bean retired,” Carter said.

After a 25-year career, Sgt. Bean retired on Nov. 22.

“That left a vacancy for a sergeant’s position,” Carter said. “You have to have at least three years on with us to become eligible to apply, and Officer Maifeld was the only candidate interested in the position.”

Maifeld was promoted to corporal in September 2008.

“With Officer Maifeld’s promotion, that left a vacancy at the corporal rank and Lawrence Winson was eligible for corporal. With corporal, you have to have at least two years on with the department,” Carter said.

Maifeld was hired by the Rumford Police Department in May 1988 as a reserve officer. In February 1990, he was hired full time and graduated from the Maine Criminal Justice Academy in Vassalboro in the fall of 1990.

He was trained to be a Drug Abuse Resistance Education instructor in September 1993, and is also an intoxilyzer instructor, among other department jobs such as creating and maintaining the department’s website.

On March 26, 1998, Maifeld was honored with being one of two officers in Maine to be the first inducted into the Maine Law Enforcement Torch Run Hall of Fame.

He was inducted for more than a decade of dedicated service to the Torch Run and for helping to further the goals of Special Olympics Maine.

Winson was hired part time in August 2005 and full time in March 2006. Before working for Rumford, he worked for Dixfield.

According to a short biography on the department website, he enjoys doing patrols to get impaired drivers off the road and “feels there is no greater job than being a police officer.”

Winson graduated from the criminal justice academy in December 2006 and is currently one of the department’s Taser instructors and a member of the department’s Honor Guard.

Winson also has a goal of someday having a police dog on patrol.

Carter said the rank of corporal was created in September 2008 when the department began using that rank for supervisors.

tkarkos@sunjournal.com