AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) — A Maine man who bit off a portion of another man’s ear during a fight has been acquitted of assault charges.

A Kennebec County Superior Court jury on Wednesday cleared Dylan Nathaniel Hendsbee of charges connected to the fight in April 2013 in which a third man suffered a fractured jaw.

The 22-year-old Gardiner man testified that he was being choked by Jason Robert Kimball and biting his ear was the only way to defend himself.

Kimball had come to the aid of another man who was on Hendsbee’s family’s property and had not left after being warned he was trespassing.

The Kennebec Journal reports that Hendsbee’s attorney said his client was trying to get strangers off his property and thus had every right to use force.