PORTLAND – A defense witness in the second murder trial of Brandon Thongsavanh on Friday reversed his testimony from two years ago, saying now he didn’t see Thongsavanh with a knife before or after Morgan McDuffee was stabbed to death in Lewiston.
Nick Barajas of Auburn was the first witness called by defense attorney Scott Lynch after the state rested its case against the 22-year-old Lewiston man on the eighth day of the trial in Cumberland County Superior Court.
Thongsavanh is being tried again for the 22-year-old Bates College senior’s death during a fight between Bates students and Auburn youths at about 2:30 a.m. March 3, 2002, on Main Street. His conviction in 2003 was overturned by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court on grounds that the jury was biased.
Barajas, 24, acknowledged on the witness stand he’s been convicted of burglary and theft and is on probation. He’s turned his life around, he said, attended college and works at an elevator repair job that pays $29 an hour.
In the minutes after the Lexington, Mass., engineering student was stabbed five times – four times in the back and stomach and once in the heart – Barajas drove his black Chevrolet Blazer from the scene. Thongsavanh was in the front, Nate Tao in the back. The three arrived at Justin Asselin’s apartment in Auburn, where a group had been partying earlier, and arrived before Chad Aube, who had been at the fight, Barajas said.
The defense maintains McDuffee was stabbed by Aube, 23, of Lewiston.
When Aube walked into the apartment, “He had blood on his shirt in the chest area down to his knees on his pants,” Barajas said.
“As God as your witness, there’s no question” that’s what he saw, Lynch asked the defense witness.
“No question,” Barajas answered.
Aube walked into the bedroom, while Thongsavanh went into the kitchen, Barajas said.
Lynch asked the witness if Thongsavanh had any blood on his clothes or whether Barajas had seen him with a knife that night.
“No,” Barajas said.
“You don’t like Chad Aube, do you?” Assistant Attorney General Lisa Marchese asked Barajas during cross-examination.
“We’re not friends,” Barajas answered.
She frequently asked Barajas if he had been telling the truth when he testified at the 2003 trial.
“Yes,” he answered sometimes; other times, he said, “I guess so.”
She asked if he saw Thongsavanh with Barajas’ black-handled knife the night McDuffee was stabbed.
“No,” Barajas said in the monotone that marked most of his testimony.
Marchese then prompted Barajas to read his 2003 testimony in which he said Thongsavanh was playing with the knife in his SUV as they rode from the fight. Thongsavanh was “holding” the knife and “flicking it open,” Barajas testified at that time.
On Friday, he said he didn’t remember saying that.
Marchese asked Barajas if he remembered testifying two years ago that while he was driving from the stabbing, Tao said to fellow passenger Thongsavanh, “‘You just jacked that kid,'” to which Thongsavanh said nothing.
“I don’t remember that,” Barajas said.
Marchese asked the witness if he remembered testifying that the last person he saw with his knife was Thongsavanh
Barajas said he didn’t remember.
On Friday, Barajas testified for the defense that he initially left Thongsavanh out of his early interviews with police because he “didn’t think there was any reason to” mention him.
Marchese asked him if he remembered testifying in 2003 that he and Tao agreed not to tell police that Tao told Barajas he saw Thongsavanh stab McDuffee.
Barajas said Friday he didn’t.
Before the state rested its case earlier Friday, Marchese asked the lead investigator, Maine State Police Detective Richard Fowler, to play a tape of Thongsavanh’s interview by police after his arrest on March 4, 2002. In that interview Fowler and Lewiston Police Detective Brian O’Malley told Thongsavanh that several people informed police he had not been home with his girlfriend the night of the stabbing, but Thongsavanh said he had been.
The trial will begin its third week at 9 a.m. Monday, with Thongsavanh expected to take the stand. Thongsavanh did not testify during the 2003 trial.
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