Sergio Hairston pleads guilty to manslaughter in fatal stabbing

AUBURN – A 19-year-old Lewiston man was sentenced Friday to serve 15 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to manslaughter in connection with a fatal stabbing a year ago in Lewiston.

Sergio Hairston was charged with murder. His trial was set to start next week. Attorneys struck a deal earlier this week after a pretrial hearing on defense motions that included an effort to share with a jury the victim’s criminal history.

A murder conviction would have carried a sentence of 25 years to life in prison. Manslaughter, a class A felony, is punishable by up to 30 years in jail.

Hairston also agree to plead guilty to aggravated assault.

A prosecutor told the judge in Androscoggin County Superior Court that she agreed to drop the murder charge and add the lesser charge for two reasons: The memory of a key witness is foggy about the events and a jury might have believed the defendant had stabbed the victim in self-defense.

Hairston was sentenced to 20 years in prison with all but 15 years suspended, plus four years of probation. That means he would end up serving the additional five years of his sentence if he were to violate his probation.

Conditions of his probation include:

• no contact with the victim’s wife, daughter or son;

• no excessive use of alcohol;

• no illegal drugs;

• random searches for drugs; and

• substance abuse evaluation and treatment.

Assistant Attorney General Lisa Marchese told Justice Joyce Wheeler what evidence and testimony she would have presented at a trial. Police said Hairston went to an apartment on Bartlett Street looking to collect on a drug debt from Dustin Lessard, son of stabbing victim Richard Lessard.

It was the father who let Hairston into the second-floor apartment then went in search of his son’s phone number. Lessard’s wife, Pauline, saw Hairston and told him to leave, hitting him with a box containing window blinds. Police said Hairston cut Pauline Lessard on the chest with a knife, then stabbed Richard Lessard three time in the chest, he told his daughter, who came into the apartment after telling a neighbor to call police. Richard Lessard died from his wounds.

Police caught up later with Hairston and found a bloody washcloth and knife. Blood on his hands and the knife matched Richard Lessard’s DNA, Marchese said.

Both Pauline and Richard Lessard had high levels of crack cocaine and alcohol in their blood from a night of partying, Marchese said.

Wheeler asked Hairston to stand while he entered his guilty pleas. He stood dressed in a blue jail suit next to his attorney, Scott Quigley.

“Are you pleading guilty because you are in fact guilty?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Hairston answered.

Wheeler accepted his plea and approved the sentence. “I believe this to be a fair and equitable outcome of this tragedy,” she said.

As he was handcuffed and led from the courtroom, he smiled and waved to a couple dozen of his family members and friends who sat through the proceeding.

Outside, his father, Stephen Hairston, said his son was lured up to the apartment and was merely defending himself, but he couldn’t take a chance on a jury finding him guilty of murder.

“He had to take a deal because it would be the best thing for him.”