BANGOR — Evidence began to build Friday against two men accused of killing a 52-year-old Bradley man, as the state prosecutor began to lay out a methodically prepared case that he hopes will lead to a guilty verdict.

Assistant Attorney General William Stokes told jurors Thursday that the story of the slaying of George Hardesty would come to them in bits and pieces from a number of witnesses.

On Friday morning Stokes began to lead them down a path that he says will take them to the doorstep of the Hardestys’ home on Route 178.

Charles Jones Jr. and Douglas Burr, both 22 years old and originally from Portland and Falmouth, are charged with the Oct. 3, 1996, shooting death of Hardesty in his home. The prosecution contends that Hardesty was shot once in the head when he interrupted a burglary.

Burr and Jones are blaming each other for the killing.

The death ended a two-month burglary spree that spanned six counties. Both men also were charged with more than 40 counts of burglary and theft and have pleaded guilty to all of them except those seven that occurred on the day that Hardesty was killed.

A third man, Matti Aalto of Portland, participated in the burglary ring as well, but left the group and hitchhiked home to a Bangor apartment moments before Hardesty’s home was burglarized.

Aalto has pleaded guilty to several counts of theft and burglary, and is awaiting sentencing. He will be a key witness for the state and is expected to testify Monday against Burr and Jones.

On Friday, Special Agent Kenneth MacMaster of the Maine State Police described for the jury what police found when they searched Jones and Burr’s apartment at 55 Market St. in Bangor, one week after Hardesty’s death.

Stolen property “was just everywhere,” MacMaster said. “It was overwhelming.”

It took months for police to sort through the hundreds of items, including 38 guns, and figure out to whom they belonged.

Stokes presented the jury with a poster-sized flip chart that listed 26 burglaries that occurred between Aug. 6 and Oct. 2, 1996, to which Burr and Jones pleaded guilty last Monday.

Using MacMaster as a witness, Stokes led the jury through each burglary, listing items taken which later were recovered at the Market Street apartment. MacMaster told jurors where in the apartment the stolen items were located, such as a 48-inch TV stolen from a home in Monroe that sat prominently in the middle of Jones and Burr’s living room.

And then there were the guns. A .357-caliber Magnum handgun on the vanity in the bathroom, a Beretta handgun placed casually atop a stereo speaker in the living room, ammunition clips underneath the living room sofa, guns under the cellar stairs, guns tucked into the rafters in the cellar, a Ruger revolver lying on the floor of Burr’s bedroom, a shotgun and a handgun in Burr’s bedroom closet, shotguns and rifles under a table in the cellar.

There were multiple CD players, VCRs and TVs. “More guns and electronic equipment than a dozen people would ever need,” according to MacMaster.

Underneath the deck detectives found a .357-caliber Magnum revolver that police say was used to kill George Hardesty. On Burr’s bureau “where he kept various types of memorabilia” was the shotgun shell from which came the bullet that later was pulled from the wall of Hardesty’s home.

Police spent three business days cataloging and photographing the property and loading it into a 24-foot Ryder truck.

Not leaving any burglary unaccounted for, Stokes called to the stand four residents from Eddington and Brewer whose homes were burglarized on the day Hardesty was killed. Burr and Jones have not pleaded guilty to those burglaries and those cases are being tried this week along with the murder case.

One by one the homeowners took the stand and Stokes presented them with items that police recovered from Market Street.

“Is this your brass towel rack?” Stokes asked one Brewer resident.

The prosecutor kept pulling items from boxes and homeowners kept identifying those items as things that were stolen from their homes on Oct. 3.

Gerald Meyers of Brewer identified his .357-caliber Magnum revolver that police believe was stolen from his home at around 2 p.m. and used about two hours later to kill Hardesty.

Burr, Jones and Aalto were arrested Oct. 9 after police had formed a task force to investigate Hardesty’s death and the possible link to the rash of burglaries across the state.

One of the few links police had was the presence of a white van with an emblem of crossed checkered flags that was spotted at or near several of the homes which were burglarized.

Minutes after a task force meeting, the van was spotted by police traveling along Interstate 95 near Hogan Road in Bangor. Police followed the van to a mailing and packaging business on Stillwater Avenue.

Police learned that Burr and Jones had sent some money by Western Union to a man named Gabe Holmes.

The van was seized and Burr and Jones eventually were arrested, but police did not learn until several hours later about the apartment at 55 Market St.

Shortly after they learned of the apartment’s existence they posted an officer outside and awaited a warrant to search it. Meanwhile, a state trooper happened to stop a U-Haul truck cruising along I-95 heading for Bangor.

The driver of the van was Gabe Holmes, according to Stokes.

“If the timing had been different in the case, that U-Haul would have been filled, the apartment would have been empty and this case may not have been solved,” he told jurors during his opening arguments Thursday.

But police got there first and instead of cashing in on the multitude of stolen property, Burr and Jones faced it head-on in the courtroom Friday as Stokes stacked it up in front of the jury.

Also Friday, former Deputy Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Kristin Sweeney testified that Hardesty died of a single gunshot wound to the head. The bullet entered at the left eyebrow and exited the back of his head.

Hardesty, she told jurors, probably lived for several minutes and lost the majority of the blood in his body before he died.