INCORRECT MONTH — The trial date for Todd Gamache, indicted on a murder charge, will likely will be scheduled for April 2008. An earlier version of the story on the Web and on Friday’s A1 was incorrectly submitted to the Sun Journal.

AUBURN – A local man accused of killing a toddler is likely to go to trial in January, his attorney said Thursday.

Todd Gamache, 23, is charged with murdering 8-month-old Emmy-Leigh Cole in March.

Lewiston defense attorney David Van Dyke said his client likely will defend himself on the charge in court after the new year.

Attorneys for both sides appeared in court last week to discuss the status of the case with Androscoggin County Superior Court Justice Thomas Delahanty II.

Van Dyke said he may seek a pretrial hearing on the adequacy of the state’s medical evidence before a jury is given the case.

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“I think we’ll know a lot more in about a month when the medical facts become more solidified than now,” he said, noting the trial will hinge on testimony surrounding the toddler’s injuries.

“It’s a medical case,” Van Dyke said.

A hearing would leave it up to the judge to decide whether certain medical evidence should be allowed at trial or should be limited.

A Maine State Police detective testified at a June bail hearing that Gamache had changed his story to explain how the toddler got her injuries. Gamache was denied bail. He remains incarcerated at Androscoggin County Jail in Auburn.

Gamache told police in interviews that he had been alone with Cole for about 45 minutes at his girlfriend’s Auburn home on Broad Street in December while she was at cheerleading practice.

Calling the toddler’s death a “tragic accident,” Gamache told police during his final version of events that Cole slipped out of his hands in the bathtub while he was bathing her. She fell from his arms again in the living room, he told police in the interview.

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Maine State Police Detective Scott Gosselin testified in court that Gamache’s story didn’t square with doctors’ observations of Cole’s injuries.

Cole was rushed to the hospital on March 22 with severe injuries. She died two days later after she was taken off life support at a Portland hospital.

In addition to police interviews, Gamache provided written accounts of the events leading up to Cole’s hospitalization.

 


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