FRYEBURG — Police said a 42-year-old Fryeburg man is charged with aggravated domestic violence assault for attempting to strangle a 41-year-old woman and hitting an 8-year-old boy with a plastic bat.

According to a written statement from Fryeburg Police Chief Joshua Potvin, police responded to Fryeburg Apartments on Cobb Street on Thursday after dispatchers received a 911 hang-up call. When police arrived, the woman and child reported being assaulted and their attacker had left the apartment.

While Fryeburg Rescue arrived to treat the two victims, police from Bridgton and Fryeburg found Kurtis Howard, identified as the attacker, behind the apartment building, Potvin said. After a brief foot chase, Howard was charged with obstructing the report of a crime, aggravated domestic violence assault and domestic violence assault with prior convictions. He was also wanted on four warrants charging criminal trespass, criminal mischief, operating under the influence, domestic violence assault, domestic violence criminal threatening and violating conditions of release.

According to Potvin, police were alerted to the assault when “a courageous 8-year-old boy called 911 after witnessing his mother being assaulted. The boy tried protecting his mother by hitting the suspect with a plastic baseball bat.”

Potvin said Howard took the bat from the boy and struck him with it before fleeing.

Howard was transported to the Oxford County Jail in Paris.