By Lisa Chmelecki,Staff Writer

AUBURN – Who started the fire that destroyed a four-story apartment building in Auburn last March?

Was it Kenneth Rideout Jr., the man charged with arson, who is currently standing trial? Or was it his ex-girlfriend, the state’s lead witness in the case?

That is one question facing the 14 jurors chosen for Rideout’s trial, which began Monday in Androscoggin County Superior Court.

The 35-year-old Auburn man was charged with arson last March, accused of setting fire to the building at the corner of Main and Newbury streets and displacing seven families.

Fire investigators determined the fire was set on March 22 in the kitchen of the fourth-floor apartment. The apartment was being leased by Clifford and Rebecca Miller.

Clifford Miller was in the hospital the night of the blaze. Rebecca Miller was home with Rideout, her boyfriend at the time.

Deputy District Attorney Craig Turner told jurors Monday during his opening statement that Rideout admitted to two people – an inmate at the Androscoggin County Jail and Rebecca Miller – that he started the fire.

But, according to Rideout’s attorney, Rebecca Miller was the one doing the confessing.

Defense attorney Thomas Goodwin told jurors during his opening statement that he will present witnesses who talked to Miller in the days after the blaze.

“She told them that she set the fire,” Goodwin said. “She told them why she set it and how she set it.”

Goodwin assured the jurors that the case against Miller was “every bit as strong and compelling” as the state’s case against Rideout.

The fire was reported at about 8 p.m.

Other tenants in the building reported hearing a couple on the fourth floor screaming at each other and throwing things earlier that night. A few of them also saw a couple drive away in an old black pickup truck.

Moments later, as firefighters were responding to the blaze, a Lewiston police officer stopped Rideout and Miller on Lisbon Street in Lewiston. The officer pulled them over because the truck had been swerving in and out of the other lane.

The officer didn’t suspect that the couple was involved in the Auburn fire until Rideout told him that they had come from 127 Newbury St. Rideout was charged with operating under the influence and taken to the Androscoggin County Jail. Miller was taken to the Auburn Police Department to be questioned about the blaze.

Miller told investigators that she and Rideout left the building together, but Rideout turned around and went back inside. She assumed that he forgot something, so she went to the truck to wait for him, Turner told the jurors.

She claims that she didn’t notice the smoke until after they drove away, at which point she asked Rideout about it and he told her that he was responsible.

“He said, I set the place on fire. I did it,'” Turner said.

At the time of her interview with police, Miller was carrying a backpack filled with lighters and matches, a fire investigator testified Monday.

Rideout was held at the county jail on the driving charge. The arson charge came days later after another inmate contacted police and told them that Rideout admitted to starting the blaze by setting fire to pieces of cardboard. The inmate said Rideout told him that he lied to police because he knew they could never prove he did it.

“It’s up to you to determine if there is any truth at all to what (that inmate) says,” Goodwin told the jurors. “There is plenty of evidence that somebody else did this crime.”

If convicted, Rideout could be sentenced to up to 30 years in prison.

The trial is expected to end Wednesday.