State prosecutors are asking the Maine Supreme Judicial Court to uphold the manslaughter conviction of a Portland man who killed his sister’s boyfriend nearly five years ago.
Assistant Attorney General Leanne Robbin told the justices on Tuesday that the facts don’t “support a different outcome,” according to the Portland Press Herald.
Thomas Hallett, who is representing Mark Cardilli Jr. during the appeals process, maintained that Cardilli’s original defense team “did not do their jobs” and that Cardilli was justified in using deadly force, the Press Herald reported.
In the early morning hours of March 16, 2019, Cardilli, then 24 years old, shot to death 22-year-old Isahak Muse of South Portland at the Cardilli family home on Milton Street. Muse, a Black man, was staying the night at the Cardilli home, where he was visiting his girlfriend, Cardilli’s then-17-year-old sister Chelsey.
Cardilli wasn’t arrested until April of that year after a Cumberland County grand jury indicted him on a murder charge.
The Maine medical examiner’s office determined Muse died from gunshot wounds to the back.
The shooting death of Muse sparked outrage and protest among Portland’s Somali and immigrant communities.
During the 2019 trial, Cardilli’s sister testified that the relationship with her brother became strained after he joined the Army. She told the court her brother made racist and Islamophobic comments, and that both her brother and father disapproved of her relationship with Muse, whom she described as a frequent guest at the Milton Street home.
Cardilli was found guilty of manslaughter in December 2019 after a bench trial, and he was sentenced to 11 years in prison with all but 7.5 years suspended and four years of probation.
Cardilli unsuccessfully appealed his conviction to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, which in 2021 agreed with Cumberland County Superior Court Justice Nancy Mills that Muse didn’t pose a reasonable threat to Cardilli warranting the use of deadly force.
But during a two-day hearing before Cumberland County Superior Court Justice John O’Neill last April, Hallett, who was then representing Cardilli, argued that his client didn’t receive proper counsel during his original trial and his original lawyers failed to “vigorously argue” that Cardilli had, in fact, acted in self-defense.
According to the defense’s version of events, the Cardilli family had objected to Muse visiting Chelsey on March 15, 2019, but ultimately relented to him coming to Milton Street. When he reportedly failed to leave at the agreed upon time of 1 a.m., Cardilli and his father attempted to force Muse out of the house.
A shoving match broke out, and Cardilli, who was staying with his parents during a stint home from the U.S. Army, went to his room to get a handgun, which he pointed at Muse and demanded he leave.
Cardilli maintains that Muse attacked him before he fired the fatal shots.
In August, O’Neill issued an opinion overturning Cardilli’s manslaughter conviction. The decision dismayed the state’s Somali community.
If the supreme court doesn’t overturn O’Neill’s decision, Cardilli could get a new trial, the Press Herald reported.
