We may never know the exact circumstances surrounding Sheriff James DiPaola’s death Saturday in Maine.

However, we can be sure that DiPaola spent decades working to help people: first for 18 years as a Malden police officer then for 14 as Middlesex County sheriff.

His sense of duty and obligation to help those in need was felt from Somerville to Louisiana.

DiPaola dispatched sheriff’s deputies to New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The culinary arts programs he created for inmates in Middlesex jails were credited with lowering recidivism rates. He emphasized mental health and substance abuse counseling for the inmates he supervised.

As a leader in law enforcement, he boldly called on the state legislature to end mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent offenders.

In Somerville, DiPaola was known as a helpful ally ready to assist in times of need. Mayor Joe Curtatone said he saved the city thousands by donating clean-up resources after last summer’s floods.

When DiPaola explored the idea of building a jail in Somerville to alleviate extreme overcrowding at the Cambridge jail, he immediately opened a dialogue with the activists most concerned about the plan.

That was Jimmy DiPaola’s style: gracious, eager to explore all sides of an issue and selfless when it came to helping others. In the crush of media attention to his death, let’s remember how he lived his life too.