A person upon whom a notice is served pursuant to section 211 shall comply with the terms thereof unless otherwise provided by the order of a court of this State. Any person who fails to appear, or with intent to avoid, evade or prevent compliance, in whole or in part, with any civil investigation under this section, removes from any place, conceals, withholds or destroys, mutilates, alters or by any other means falsifies any documentary material in the possession, custody or control of any person subject of any such notice, or knowingly conceals any relevant information, shall be subject to a civil penalty of not more than $5,000 payable to the State to be recovered in a civil action.   [PL 1977, c. 696, §35 (AMD).]

Whenever a person fails to comply with any notice served upon that person under section 211, or whenever satisfactory copying or reproduction of any such material cannot be done and the person refuses to surrender the material, the Attorney General may file, in the Superior Court of the county in which the person resides or has that person's principal place of business or of Kennebec County, if the person is a nonresident or does not have a principal place of business in this State, and serve upon the person or in the same manner as provided in section 211 a petition for an order of the court for the enforcement of this section. Any disobedience of any final order entered under this section by any court must be punished as a contempt thereof.   [RR 2023, c. 2, Pt. B, §37 (COR).]