AUBURN – Jury deliberations began late Friday in the trial of Shaun Tuttle and David Lakin, accused of kidnapping and murdering 81-year-old James McManus of Lewiston last March.
The jury of three men and nine women met for just 90 minutes Friday before Justice Thomas E. Delahanty II recessed them for the weekend. They will return to deliberations at 9 a.m. Monday.
They must decide among accounts detailed in closing arguments Friday by prosecutors and defense lawyers.
Tuttle, 22, and Lakin, 23, both of Lewiston, both say it was the other who killed McManus by running him over with his own car on a dirt road in Turner.
It doesn’t matter which of the men did it, argued prosecutor Lisa Marchese in closing.
“Only the moment when they ran over Mr. McManus did they not work together,” Marchese said.
All night on March 9, 2004, they targeted McManus for murder, she said. The elderly man – just 5 feet, 6 inches tall and weighing 140 pounds – was an “easy target,” she argued.
After spending the night drinking – first at a Lewiston pub and then at the home of Lakin’s friend, Christopher Ballou – the pair entered McManus’ Blake Street apartment hooded in similar sweatshirts.
“They went there to kill him,” Marchese said.
Once inside, they bound the man in ropes. Then, Marchese said, “they put a belt around his neck and led him like an animal.”
Police found a broken piece of the belt in the apartment. The remainder was discovered the next day looped around his neck in the trunk of his car on Horton Street, according to earlier testimony.
After leading him to his car, the pair drove to Turner with McManus, she said.
Marchese said she doesn’t know why the killing happened.
“I can’t prove the motive any more than I can prove who ran over Mr. McManus’ head,” Marchese told the jury.
The evidence – from Lakin and Tuttle’s DNA on the steering wheel to McManus’ blood on both men’s clothes – suggests that the pair murdered the man together, she said.
“Together, they’re both guilty,” she said.
The defense rests
Attorneys for Lakin and Tuttle spent their closing arguments trying to widen the distance between the pair, who had never met until the night of March 9.
Lakin’s lawyer, Kevin Joyce, portrayed Tuttle as an explosive thug who’d attached himself to Lakin.
Released from jail the day before after serving time on a probation violation, Tuttle was involved in a fight with Lakin’s friend, Ballou, only minutes before arriving at McManus’ home.
Joyce argued that the pair, both of whom had shaved heads, put on their hoods because they were cold. And he described Lakin as passed out in the car, waking only when they reached the Turner woods.
By not stopping Tuttle from killing McManus, as Lakin contends, he may be a coward, Joyce argued.
“But that doesn’t make him guilty,” he said. Nor does the evidence, the lawyer said.
Joyce also complained that too few tests were done to prove anyone’s guilt.
A verdict of not guilty, he told the jury, “includes thinking he’s guilty, but the state didn’t prove it.”
On that point, Tuttle’s lawyer agreed.
In his closing argument, attorney Thomas Goodwin called the case “window dressing.”
“You cannot say, He was there, and he must be an accomplice,'” the lawyer said. “Just being there isn’t enough.”
And, like Lakin’s attorney, he argued that Tuttle was drunk and lost in a stupor when the killing took place. And the moment he was able, he reported the crime to police.
“He called them just as soon as he practically could, just as soon as he pulled himself together,” Goodwin said.
He described the entire incident as “a nightmare.”
“(Tuttle) couldn’t guess what would happen,” Goodwin said. “He went off on this odyssey with someone he’d never met before.”
A last swipe
In her rebuttal, Marchese poked fun at the similar stories.
“Someone in this room is a flat-out liar,” said the assistant attorney general. “The car didn’t run over Mr. McManus’ body on its own.”
She took exception to defense claims that too little evidence was collected.
“We introduced 90 pieces of evidence,” she said. “If there was something more, we would have given it to you.”
And she repeated her own lack of answers.
“I don’t have a clue who is the accomplice and who is the criminal,” she said. But it doesn’t matter.
“This crime would not have occurred but for both men’s involvement,” Marchese said.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
Success. Please wait for the page to reload. If the page does not reload within 5 seconds, please refresh the page.
Enter your email and password to access comments.
Hi, to comment on stories you must . This profile is in addition to your subscription and website login.
Already have a commenting profile? .
Invalid username/password.
Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.
Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.
Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.