ROCKLAND – A Hope man charged with murdering a woman from Waldoboro told police he lost his temper over a comment she made about his ex-fiancee and he bludgeoned and stabbed her, according to court documents.

Steven Pomeroy, 23, made his initial appearance Thursday at Knox County Superior Court in connection with the death of 22-year-old Jessica Nichols. Pomeroy stood before District Judge Joseph Field, who formally charged him with murder and ordered him held until a bail hearing July 11.

Pomeroy remains in Knox County Jail.

Assistant Attorney General Leane Zainea represented the state, and Waldoboro attorney Philip Cohen represented Pomeroy at the hearing.

The state medical examiner made a positive identification of the body but had not determined Nichols’ cause of death as of 4 p.m. Thursday, officials said.

According to an affidavit, Pomeroy told police Wednesday morning that he and Nichols had been “drinking and fooling around” at his residence at 30 Pearse Road in Hope. When she made a comment about his ex-fiancee, Pomeroy lost his temper and killed Nichols, according to a statement of probable cause submitted by Detective Scott A. Bryant of the Maine State Police criminal investigation division.

Pomeroy told police that sometime Tuesday night or early Wednesday morning he hit his victim over the head with a frying pan and stabbed her repeatedly.

According to police, after cleaning up the blood in his apartment, using Pine-Sol and rags, Pomeroy placed Nichols’ body in the trunk of his car. He told police the knife he used in the stabbing had been left in his kitchen sink.

He drove the car with Nichols and the cleaning rags in the trunk to the home of William and June Brown at 5 Ash Lane in Hope. William Brown and Pomeroy were friends.

At 8 a.m. Wednesday, a 911 call was made to the Knox County Sheriff’s Department.

Trooper Jeremiah Wesbrock of Troop D Barracks in Thomaston said he heard the radio transmission of the 911 call and went to the scene, arriving at 8:20 a.m.

When he pulled into a driveway at 5 Ash Lane he was greeted by Sam Whitley, who told Wesbrock he should speak with Pomeroy. Whitley is related to Pomeroy by marriage.

Wesbrock said he asked Pomeroy what he had done. Pomeroy said he had killed somebody.

When Wesbrock asked Pomeroy where the deceased person was, the Hope man said the body was in the trunk of his vehicle.

Wesbrock and Knox County deputies opened the trunk to Pomeroy’s car and saw a naked female body in the fetal position covered with blood. Wesbrock said he checked for a pulse and found none.

Wesbrock then read Pomeroy his Miranda rights. Pomeroy said he understood them and agreed to answer questions.

Brown told Wesbrock that the vehicle in which Nichols’ body was found belonged to Pomeroy. Brown said he borrowed it for a while and registered it in his name. Pomeroy had taken the vehicle back but had not switched the registration back to his name.

Friends and relatives of Pomeroy and Nichols spoke about the two young people.

Waldoboro resident Carla Nichols, Jessica’s mother, said just before the hearing that she did not know Pomeroy.

“I don’t know how well she knew him, or when she met him,” Carla Nichols said in an interview. She also has a son, Brandon, who will be 20 in August.

Carla said a state trooper and a detective came to her house about 1:30 p.m. Wednesday and told her about her daughter’s death.

“They said they couldn’t tell me anything at the time,” Carla said.

Monday was the last day that she saw her daughter alive, Carla said. “She tried calling me Tuesday, but I wasn’t home.”

Jessica would divide her time between staying with her mother and staying in her own Waldoboro home, which she shared with a friend, Melanie Thibeau.

“She loved people,” Carla Nichols said. “There were friends all around her.

“She liked talking with her friends on the computer, and she liked music,” Nichols said. “Her friends were very important to her. They always have been.”

She said her son, Brandon, was not taking his sister’s death “too well.”

Rockland resident Judy Roscoe, a close family friend, said she had come to the hearing with Carla to support her and “to look Pomeroy in the eye and tell him what he had taken from the family.”

Pomeroy’s sister, Stacy Whitley of Hope, said after the court hearing that her brother’s alleged violence was out of character.

“I know we can’t take it back, and we can’t [bring] her back, but I just want them to know that our hearts go out to them,” she said.

Friends of Pomeroy agreed with his family that the violence was out of character.

A clerk at the Pushaw Trading Post on Main Street in Hope, who didn’t want to give her name, said Pomeroy shopped there and that he had been parked outside the store Wednesday morning.

“I knew of the girl, but I never knew her,” she said of Jessica Nichols.

“I never had a problem with him, and he was always polite and friendly.”

She described Pomeroy as “happy-go-lucky” and someone who played golf on occasion.

A young woman at the store, who said she was a classmate of Pomeroy through grade school and high school, also did not want to give her name.

“I never even imagined anything like that from him,” she said of the alleged slaying.

Andrew Stewart, owner of Hope General Store on Route 105, said Pomeroy was a customer.

“He always seemed like a really nice guy who had a lot of friends,” Stewart said.

Anyone with any information about the case may call Lt. Gary Wright of the Maine State Police criminal investigation division at 800-452-4664.

gchappell@bangordailynews.net

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