Portland man guilty of manslaughter

PORTLAND – A man accused of driving a knife into the chest of his friend in Westbrook will serve 10 years in prison for manslaughter under an agreement with prosecutors.

Anthony Osborne, 24, of Portland entered the guilty plea Thursday in Cumberland County Superior Court. In exchange, prosecutors dropped a charge of murder, which carries the potential of a life sentence.

The agreement calls for Osborne to serve 10 years of a 15-year prison sentence to be followed by six years of probation.

Osborne, who was accused of stabbing Brandon Feyler after a long night of drinking, apologized before he was sentenced.

“I feel sorry for his family, and I feel sorry for my family,” he said. “His son will have to grow up without a father and my two sons will have to grow up without a father for a long time. When I go to sleep at night I dream about it. It just don’t go away. All I can say is, I’m sorry.”

Feyler’s father and brother were in the courtroom but left without comment.

Justice Roland A. Cole said he believed the plea bargain was a fair one. “A terrible thing has happened and Mr. Feyler is dead,” he said. “Mr. Osborne will have a chance to think about this and hopefully he will see that this lifestyle is fraught with danger.”

Feyler was brought to Brighton Medical Center with a deep stab wound in his chest early on Oct. 27. Because the hospital did not have an emergency room, he was taken to Maine Medical Center, where he died.

There were several accounts of what happened that night. Osborne said Feyler and some other men jumped him, while others told police that Osborne stabbed Feyler after another fight earlier in the evening.

Osborne’s lawyer, Jodi Nofsinger, said she would have shown a jury pictures of her client with heavy cuts and bruises around his eyes and scratches on his back and stomach to support the notion that he was attacked.

Assistant Attorney General Fernand Larochelle said he did not believe he could have convicted Osborne of murder.