By Doug Fletcher,Staff Writer

AUBURN – In the days before his wife was fatally beaten and left to die, John Stasulis confronted the man he suspected was having an affair with her.

“He denied it,” Stasulis told jurors at Androscoggin County Superior Court Wednesday.

So had Leslie Stasulis earlier, her husband said.

Without proof, he did little but continue on as they were: Sharing the same bed but “living separate lives.”

Then, on Sept. 11, 2003, Stasulis said he and his wife had “had the best day we had in a long while. We talked.”

Hours later, Leslie Stasulis, her face battered, her skull bashed, was found lying perfectly perpendicular in the eastbound lane of Route 126 near Sabattus Pond. She died nine days later.

Now, Roger Keene – Leslie Stasulis’ lover – is on trial, charged with manslaughter, kidnapping and attempted murder in connection with her death.

John Stasulis told the jury that on that day he had some drinks at another bar as his wife went to work at hers, Leslie’s Place on Lisbon Street in Lewiston.

When he joined her there, “She told me I had one too many,” and sent him to his basement office, where he kept a couch for such occasions.

When he awoke he puttered with paperwork before going back up to the bar. There, he said, he was bewildered to find Leslie gone.

That’s when Silvo Martin, who was tending bar in Leslie’s absence, told him, “She left with Roger.”

“I blurted out: Tomorrow I see the divorce lawyer,” Stasulis said.

When Keene briefly walked into the bar alone a while later, Stasulis cursed him out and ordered him out, never to return.

The next day, but instead of seeing a divorce lawyer, Stasulis was seeing his badly beaten wife resting comatose in the intensive care unit at Central Maine Medical Center.

Keene, meanwhile, was asking his boss for the day off, telling him that Leslie had been beaten and dumped in Sabattus.

That boss, Allen Kapocious, told jurors that he knew that Keene and Leslie Stasulis had been seeing each other. He said that he could see how upset Keene was. Sure, he said he told Keene, take the day.

Hours later, at the urging of police who visited the Brunswick tire shop where Kapocious and Keene worked, Kapocious called his employee. The call was taped.

On Wednesday, Assistant Attorney General Lisa Marchese played it in court. During the call, Keene told his boss, “They did find out that she was beaten by a tire iron.”

He added that he had an idea who was responsible:

“I got to think it was her ex-husband. … If he didn’t do it himself, he had someone do it. … He’s got a lot to lose,” Keene said.

In a second call to police later that day, Keene said that John Stasulis had beaten his wife in the past. The jury is to finish listening to that tape today.

Leslie Stasulis’ daughter, Maria Guimond, told jurors Wednesday that she had stopped by her mother’s bar on the night of Sept. 11, 2003, to visit. Keene and Leslie Stasulis were talking.

Guimond overheard Keene tell her mother, “Fine, you’ll regret this,” but added that she wasn’t sure what they were talking about.

Later that night, she said Keene came by her house. He asked “if I had seen her,” and said her mother was gone, that people were looking for her.

When she asked Keene about their relationship, “He said that my mom had broke it off. That my mom said she couldn’t take it anymore.”

The trial resumes at 9 this morning.