People who attended a 2022 overnight visit to Acadia National Park said Thursday that they were worried about being run over by a Portland man who, according to police, later ran over and killed a woman at that same gathering.
Raymond Lester, 37, is on trial for murder in the death of Nicole Mokeme during a June 2022 retreat for Black people at the Schoodic Institute in Acadia National Park. Lester, who was dating Mokeme, 35, of South Portland, ran her over around midnight on June 18, 2022 and then fled to Mexico, according to police.
Attendees at the retreat, which had been organized by Mokeme, testified Thursday at Lester’s trial in Ellsworth. Several of them recounted how Lester behaved at a dinner the group had at an outdoor pavilion on the institute campus the night that Mokeme was killed.
Eric Martin, a Portland resident and a friend of Mokeme’s, said Lester was driving his BMW X3 erratically around the pavilion during the dinner. Lester was blaring a loud song with violent lyrics from his car during the dinner, disturbing the rest of the group, and drove around in short bursts, often at speeds faster than the posted 15 mph speed limit, he said.
At times, Lester zipped past people in his car at close range, within 5 to 10 feet of them, Martin said. He stopped the car a few times and, while blaring the loud song on repeat, would point his finger like a gun at people in the group and loudly say the words “boom boom boom” along with the music.
Martin’s significant other, Dorrett Field, testified that they decided to leave the dinner with their daughter, who was 12 years old at the time, and go back to a bunkhouse on the campus, where members of the group slept during their visit.
As they walked away from the group on a path, Lester drove past them in his car on a road a few feet away and then stopped, she said. They then waited behind a cluster of trees, using it as a barrier between them and Lester, and waited for him to drive off again before they went across the road and then along the path toward the bunkhouse.
Field testified that their daughter was worried Lester would run them over.
“We were a little scared,” Field said. “She said ‘He’s going to hit us,’ but I said ‘We’re okay.’”
Their daughter went to turn on her light on her phone so they could see in the dark, but Martin said they should not turn on their lights, so that Lester would have a harder time seeing them when he drove back, Field said.
Hanna Naji, a friend of Mokeme’s, testified Thursday that she attended the retreat and was at the outdoor dinner when Lester was driving aggressively near the group, causing people to worry that he might hit someone. Naji also said Lester pointed his fingers like guns at other people while loudly listening to a song with violent lyrics.
Naji, who at times teared up on the witness stand, said Lester’s behavior was rude and inappropriate, especially because young children and older people – including Naji’s parents – were part of the group.
“The lyrics with the [shooting] motions gave me huge concerns, enough for me to say ‘Don’t do this in front of my parents,’” Naji said.
Naji said that as she and others later were walking back to the bunkhouse, they also at times hid among the trees so as not to be exposed to Lester’s aggressive and dangerous driving.
Mokeme’s body was found the next morning nearby on a walking path with injuries consistent with having been run over by a car and with several pieces of black plastic that looked like they came from a car a few feet away. Police also found tire tracks among trees that led from the roadway to the place where Mokeme’s body was found.
Lester left the Institute hours before Mokeme’s body was found and drove south, first to southern Maine and then to Rhode Island, Georgia and Texas. He was arrested about a month later in Mexico and his car has not been found, according to prosecutors.
Testimony in the trial is expected to resume Friday morning in Ellsworth.
