Court rejects appeal in manslaughter case

PORTLAND – The state Supreme Court on Monday declined to overturn manslaughter and kidnapping convictions of a West Virginia man whose partner in a marijuana-growing operation was tied to a tree and later found dead in 1989.

A Superior Court judge last year imposed maximum 40-year sentences on Patrick Alexandre. He and the victim, Joseph Cloak Jr., were growing marijuana on a plot near Alexandre’s home in LaGrange.

But Alexandre told jurors in Penobscot County Superior Court that it was a friend from New Hampshire, Charles Emery, who covered Cloak’s head in duct tape and used a chain and handcuffs to bind him to a tree.

Alexandre acknowledged helping bury Cloak’s body in the town of Bradford, but he said he did so because he feared for his life. The state medical examiner’s office never determined the cause of Cloak’s death.

The investigation was dormant for years until Alexandre was arrested on Nov. 22, 2000, at a weigh station on Interstate 95 in Old Town. He was held because of a probation violation in a drug case in West Virginia.

While in jail, Alexandre told guards he had witnessed a murder while living in Maine and knew where a body was buried.

During the trial, Emery, who was living in North Hampton, N.H., did not testify after telling the judge that he would incriminate himself by doing so.

Prosecutors contended Alexandre was at least partially responsible because Emery alone would not have been able to chain and handcuff Cloak to a tree.

The Supreme Judicial Court dismissed Alexandre’s appeal in a two-page memorandum of decision.

Emery was never charged but remains under investigation in the case, said Bill Stokes, Maine’s deputy attorney general for criminal division.