Witnesses say Lockhart said he’d kill wife Lawyer argues woman’s death was manslaughter not murder

AUGUSTA – Even though Stephen Lockhart’s attorney said that his client did not intend to kill his wife, multiple witnesses testified Tuesday that Lockhart threatened to kill Andrea Lockhart on more than one occasion before he allegedly fatally struck her with a piece of wood and encased her body in fiberglass.

In his opening remarks in Kennebec County Superior Court Tuesday morning, Bangor attorney Chris Largay told a jury that Lockhart “snapped” Dec. 11, 1998, while he was arguing with his estranged wife in a boat shop below his Manset apartment. Lockhart, 37, was working at the Jarvis Newman boatyard and renting an apartment over the company office when Andrea Lockhart died.

“He never meant to cause the death of Andrea,” Largay said. He told members of the jury that they should consider convicting Lockhart for manslaughter, rather than for murder, when deciding his client’s fate.

But after Largay and prosecutor Lisa Marchese made their opening statements, two witnesses testified that Lockhart had threatened to kill his 32-year-old wife before her death.

Lewis Moore, the former owner of the Manset boatyard where Lockhart worked, said that three days before Andrea Lockhart was killed, Stephen Lockhart said that he had told his estranged wife he would kill her if she contacted the Department of Health and Human Services about their three children. Lockhart told him so as they drove to eat lunch at the Kozy Kove restaurant in Southwest Harbor, he said.

“I certainly didn’t take it as a joke,” Moore said. “There was no laughter in the car.” He added that he did not think Lockhart meant the comment literally because it was out-of-character for him to make violent threats.

“I was stunned,” Moore added.

Thomas MacDonald, a physician’s assistant at Maine Coast Memorial Hospital in Ellsworth, said that he treated Andrea Lockhart for a cut over her left eye in the hospital’s emergency room on April 18, 1997. He said she had told him her husband kicked a door that hit her in the face and that he had threatened to kill her.

MacDonald mentioned Lockhart’s alleged threat as he reread notes he had taken of Andrea’s Lockhart visit to the emergency room. The jury had been sent out of the courtroom so the attorneys could discuss what testimony would be allowed when MacDonald said Andrea Lockhart told him Stephen Lockhart had threatened her. The information was not repeated for the members of the jury when they came back into the courtroom.

MacDonald had initially characterized the door incident as an assault to the jury, but under cross- examination by Largay he acknowledged that Andrea Lockhart never said she had been assaulted. He added that he did recommend that Andrea Lockhart seek counseling at the Next Step, an anti-domestic-violence organization.

Brent Lockhart, the couple’s 10-year-old son, also testified Tuesday. He told the jury that on Halloween of 1998, when he was eight years old, he saw his father choke his mother on the couch of their Lamoine home. The boy put his hands around Marchese’s neck to show the jury what he had seen.

“My dad tried to choke my mom,” he said. “She was trying to get free.”

Largay said that Lockhart had followed his wife to an Ellsworth bar after she went out to have a few drinks with some of her co-workers from China Hill, the Ellsworth restaurant where she worked. Lockhart put on a Halloween mask before entering the bar and inside saw her “frolicking” with another man.

“That tore him apart,” Largay said.

Vaughn Nichols, the man Lockhart had seen at the bar with his wife, testified that he kissed Andrea Lockhart for the first time that night and later started dating her exclusively. He said he got a call from a man who identified himself as Andrea’s husband. The caller, in crude terms, asked him if he liked sleeping with married women, he added.

The caller said he might as well be sleeping with Andrea Lockhart because he wouldn’t be doing it for much longer, Nichols said. He said he took the implication as a threat toward him instead of a threat toward Andrea, he added.

The trial, which is expected to last all week, is scheduled to continue Wednesday morning with medical testimony from the state police and from the state medical examiner’s office. Aside from law enforcement officials and friends and family of the Lockharts, the editor and former editor of weekly newspapers in Hancock County are also listed as possible witnesses. Stephen Fay of the Ellsworth American and Earl Brechlin, formerly of the Bar Harbor Times, may be called to testify because Lockhart sent unpublished letters to each paper trying to defend himself after news of Andrea Lockhart’s death was reported, according to Largay and Marchese.

Marchese said whether Lockhart will take the stand in his own defense will be decided not by her but by Largay and defense co-counsel Anthony Sineni of Portland. Largay said he and Sineni have not yet decided if Lockhart will be called as a witness.