Four of the men accused of participating in a fight in Portland last summer that ended in the fatal shooting of a woman will be tried together as co-defendants, while the man accused of murder will be tried separately.
Aaron Karp, 47, of Naples, appeared in Cumberland County Superior Court on Monday afternoon along with four other defendants on a motion to join all of their cases for trial. The courtroom was bustling with several attorneys speaking to one another and to their clients seated in the public gallery.
Karp has pleaded not guilty to the murder charge. Investigators have said he killed 54-year-old Susan McHugh during a dispute between two motorcycle clubs near Morrill’s Corner in June. He is being held without bail at the Cumberland County Jail.
Five other suspects were arrested in November in connection to the attack and are each facing charges of elevated aggravated assault and conspiracy to commit assault. They are: Kaleb Cidre, 22, of Windham; Jason Keenan, 45, of Bath; James Moody, 30, of Bowdoin; Caleb Pelkey, 33, of Portland; and Nathan Walsh, 48, of Lewiston.
All of them posted $10,000 bail and pleaded not guilty at their arraignments in December. Cidre was not present at the hearing Monday, and he does not have an attorney yet, said Superior Court Justice John O’Neil, so only the other four men had their cases joined for now.
Portland police spokesperson Brad Nadeau confirmed Monday that police are still searching for a seventh suspect, 45-year-old Kristofer Haken, of Londonderry, New Hampshire, who faces the same charges. He is considered “dangerous and may be armed,” Nadeau said, and may be affiliated with the Outlaws Motorcycle Club.
The cases could still be severed if Haken is found, if new information comes up during Karp’s trial, or when Cidre is appointed a lawyer, O’Neil said.
The four men who did appear in court Monday met with their attorneys in person for the first time after the hearing. O’Neil recently granted their request to do so, after the court had originally ordered them not to contact one another.
The June fight stemmed from an argument on the back patio of a bar in Westbrook and escalated into the attack at a parking lot on Forest Avenue, investigators said during Karp’s bail hearing in September.
Prosecutors say the five men had a hand in planning and executing the attack with Karp, which injured McHugh’s husband and their friend and involved several weapons, including mini sledgehammers, a police-style baton and a switchblade.
Prosecutors say McHugh fired once at a group of Outlaw members who were attacking her son Travis Frechette, her husband Troy McHugh and their friend William Holmes (members of another motorcycle club called FSU). They say Karp then turned and shot nine times at McHugh, who died from a single gunshot wound.
