ELLSWORTH, Maine — A Portland man accused of running over his girlfriend and killing her in Acadia National Park fled from police because he was concerned about being mistreated by officers, his defense attorney told a jury Wednesday morning.
Raymond Lester is charged with murder in the death of Nicole Mokeme, whose mangled body was found next to a walking path at the Schoodic Institute in Acadia on the morning of June 19, 2022.
During opening arguments in Lester’s trial, his defense attorney, Caitlyn Smith, told the jury of 16 people, including 4 alternates, that no one saw Mokeme get run over.
The evidence prosecutors have is about Lester’s behavior the night before, when he was listening to loud music and driving aggressively around the Schoodic Institute campus, Smith said. Prosecutors will tell the jury that Lester fled and avoided police for a month before he was arrested in Mexico, but they do not have direct evidence that Lester killed Mokeme.
“You will not hear from one witness who saw Nicole get hit by a car,” Smith said. “You will not hear from one witness who saw anything happen to Nicole.”
The reason Lester left and avoided police was because he was “concerned” about how police treat people of color and he did not want to talk to them, Smith said.
Assistant Attorney General Leanne Robbin told the jury that Mokeme, the founder and creative director for Rise and Shine Youth Retreat, was leading a retreat for Black Mainers at the former Navy base campus. The retreat was meant to be a peaceful event where attendees could spend time and enjoy nature. But Lester “shattered” the mood at a campfire gathering the night of June 18, 2022, by driving aggressively around the campus and drinking vodka straight from a bottle, Robbin said.
He also was loudly playing a song with violent lyrics and, when other retreat attendees tried to talk to him and get him to settle down, he responded by pointing his finger at other people as if he were firing a gun.
“It should have been a joyful occasion,” Robbin told the jury. “Instead, there was a cloud over the retreat and that cloud was this man, Raymond Lester.”
Robbin also told the jury that after Lester fled, he drove south to Portland and then to Rhode Island, where he traded in his cellphone at a Walmart in Warwick. He then kept driving, to Georgia and then to Texas, and then went to Mexico. She said police never found Lester’s car, a black BMW X3 sport utility vehicle.
Robbin said Mokeme’s intestines had been forced out of her body from the impact of being run over.
Police found pieces of plastic that appeared to have come from a car near Mokeme’s body. The pieces are consistent with a black BMW XS, police have said.
The state called two witnesses Wednesday morning after opening arguments. The two men, one a student and another a faculty member, were part of a group from Massachusetts Maritime Academy that also was staying at the Schoodic Institute when Mokeme was killed.
Ryan Henry, a student at the school, testified that he found Mokeme’s crumpled body next to a walking path on the morning of June 19, 2022. Kevin Hefferan, a professor at the school, said that Mokeme appeared to have died from some sort of “violent attack,” but that he first thought it may have been by a wild animal.
The trial got underway Wednesday morning in Ellsworth and has been scheduled to run through Nov. 9.
