Jury selection begins in Bangor murder trial > Victims slain in trailer park

Potential jurors in a murder trial in Bangor were asked a range of questions Monday including their views on alcohol abuse and firearms.

Officials completed the first phase of jury selection in Penobscot County Superior Court in the opening stages of the trial of Edward Clinton Robinson Jr., who is charged with fatally shooting a man and a woman two years ago. The trial may take up to two weeks.

Patricia Maguire, 48, and Robert Blanchard, 51, were killed at Maguire’s home at what was then known as Tozier’s Trailer Park on Finson Road, Bangor. Robinson, 51, of Bangor, was arrested more than a year after their deaths.

Maguire’s and Blanchard’s children, who had accused Robinson from the start, sat through most of Monday’s proceedings.

The victims had been friends for about 15 years and were related by the marriage of Maguire’s daughter and Blanchard’s son. The night the prosecution contends they were shot, Maguire and Blanchard spent part of the evening at a Bangor night club. Witnesses have said that Robinson, who had an on-again, off-again romantic relationship with Maguire, also was at the bar that night and saw them together.

In an audiotaped interview with police shortly after the shootings, Robinson discussed his relationship with Maguire and a lingering Vietnam War-related mental illness in which he said he heard voices in his head. He also spoke of his gun collection.

Almost 100 people were called as potential jurors. As the proceedings concluded Monday, the number had been narrowed by half. The actual jury and alternates will be chosen from the remainder on Tuesday.

Those with strong feelings against the use of alcohol or firearms generally were weeded out. Some who were excused said they would have difficulty remaining impartial; one woman said she knew the mother of Heather White, a 9-year-old West Enfield girl whose death was the subject of another murder trial earlier this year.

Several were excluded from Robinson’s jury for more routine reasons, such as their familiarity with the case itself or with participants in the trial.

Assistant Attorney Jeffrey Hjelm is handling the prosecution. Representing Robinson is Wayne Foote, who assumed the case after the original court-appointed attorney, Andrew Mead, was appointed to fill a vacancy on the District Court bench.