The owner of a statue of a former U.S. Supreme Court chief justice said he has removed it at the request of county commissioners.

The statue of Melville Fuller, who was from Maine, was removed without warning from its granite base outside Kennebec County Courthouse on Sunday. Fuller supported segregation laws. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court requested the county move the statue in 2020.

Robert Fuller Jr., a relative of the chief justice, owns the statue. He said in a letter to the Kennebec Journal on Wednesday that county commissioners never required him to give advance notice of his intention to remove the statue.

Fuller Jr. wrote in his letter that he “thought it best to remove the statue and store it in a safe place for the time being.” He said he was concerned about the possibility of vandalism of the statue.