PORTLAND – The Auburn man convicted of murdering a Bates College student two years ago should be granted a new trial because evidence the jury saw and heard of his character – not his deeds – turned them against him, his lawyer argued Tuesday before the state’s highest court.

William Maselli told the seven justices of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court that there was “more than a reasonable doubt” about Brandon Thongsavanh’s guilt.”

For that reason, state prosecutors engaged in “an attempt at character assassination,” Maselli said.

Among the evidence that unfairly influenced the jury, Maselli said, were:

• An inflammatory phrase printed on Thongsavanh’s T-shirt.

• A mug shot showing him dressed in prison garb with tattoos on his neck and shaved head.

• A videotaped interrogation that included police statements about Thongsavanh’s apparent guilt and prior bad acts.

Assistant Attorney General Donald Macomber told the panel of judges that all of the evidence introduced by prosecutors in the case had at least some “probative value,” meaning it was warranted because it helped to prove elements of Thongsavanh’s guilt.

“If you look at any one of these aspects, you’ll see that the error is harmless,” Macomber said. The overall case was sound, and the verdict should not be thrown out, he said.

A ruling is not expected until July at the earliest.

Thongsavanh is serving 58 years in prison for stabbing to death popular Bates College senior Morgan McDuffee during a fight that erupted on a street near the campus.

Tuesday afternoon’s hearing lasted about 45 minutes. Families and friends of both Thongsavanh and McDuffee attended, but declined to comment publicly afterward.

This is the second time Maselli has argued for a new trial. The first time, in Superior Court last October, the judge ruled against him.

Most discussion Tuesday centered on the T-shirt that bore a derogatory reference to Jesus Christ. Thongsavanh apparently had been wearing the shirt the night of the stabbing.

“This T-shirt clearly was a horrendous thing to go up against, and you could see it in the faces of the jury,” Maselli said.

Macomber conceded the point, saying prosecutors could have “sanitized” the phrase while still making their point that the shirt made Thongsavanh identifiable to witnesses that night.

“From this record, this is a fairly inflammatory and not terribly probative phrase,” said Chief Justice Leigh Ingalls Saufley.

Maselli said a mug shot of his client was shown around the courtroom several times during the trial, picturing Thongsavanh in an orange jail-issue shirt, with tattoos of horns on his shaved head and a thorn necklace tattoo that made him look “menacing.”

By contrast, at the trial, the defendant wore a turtleneck and had grown his hair to cover the tattoos.

Macomber said the photo was used to show that Thongsavanh had altered his appearance after the stabbing.

Justice Jon D. Levy asked Macomber why prosecutors insisted on introducing evidence that could be challenged later if they could have won the case without it.

“Why did you go over the top” with the mug shot and T-shirt “if case was so good?” he asked.

“Are there things that happened that I wish had not happened? Sure,” Macomber said. But those are not the things that convicted Thongsavanh, he said.

Maselli said prosecutors also prejudiced the jury from their opening statement, saying they knew Thongsavanh had stabbed McDuffee.

“The effect of what the prosecution did in the opening statement was to end the trial right off the top,” he said.

But Saufley said the jury is expected to interpret such nuances with an open mind.

“Doesn’t that really demean the jurors?” she asked.

“Aren’t they able to sort through that hyperbole and rhetoric from” prosecutors?”