HOULTON, Maine — A forensic DNA analyst for the Maine State Police crime lab said Thursday that a jacket belonging to the accused killer of a Houlton man had a mixture of the defendant’s DNA as well as blood stains belonging to the victim on it.
In a video taped interview that Reginald Dobbins, 20, gave to state police four days after the murder, however, Dobbins said that he was not wearing the black trench coat on the night of the killing and that it was worn instead by his co-defendant in the case, Samuel Geary of Houlton.
Dobbins, 20, of Houlton, is on trial on a murder charge, accused of beating and stabbing to death Keith Suitter, 61, of Houlton, on March 1, 2015, in the victim’s mobile home on Hillview Avenue where he lived alone.
Geary, who was 16 when Suitter was killed, also was charged with the murder and, after a judge ruled that he would be tried as an adult, pleaded guilty in Washington County Superior Court in Machias on May 25. No sentencing date has been set yet for Geary, who is among 61 people on a list of potential witnesses in the Dobbins trial.
In the second half of the more than two hour video interview he did with state police, which was played for jurors Thursday, Dobbins said that he watched from outside of Suitter’s home as Geary launched a plan to “beat the crap of out [Suitter] and take his drugs and money.”
Dobbins said that Geary called him into the house after Geary had struck the victim on the back of the head with a hammer. Dobbins then said that as he watched from the doorway, Geary placed his knee on Suitter’s back and stabbed him repeatedly.
The state medical examiner previously reported that Suitter had blunt-force trauma consistent with having been struck 21 times with a hammer, and 10 stab wounds to the head and back.
Dobbins also told police on the recording that Geary cut his finger and tried to stop the bleeding by stuffing it into a bread bag that he got out of Suitter’s trash. Dobbins painted himself as shocked and sickened by the scene in the trailer.
“I am a pacifist, flat out,” he told police in the video.
Jennifer Sabine, the forensic DNA analyst, told jurors that a mixture of Geary and Suitter’s blood was found on an armchair in Suitter’s home, on the hammer shaft used in the killing, and inside Suitter’s truck, which was stolen from the crime scene afterward. Dobbins said in the video that Geary drove the truck and crashed it, but Sabine said that Geary’s DNA was found on the exterior passenger door handle, the interior passenger side door release, and on a passenger side sun visor. Geary’s DNA also was found inside a pocket of the pants that the victim was wearing.
The black trench coat belonging to Dobbins was stained in several places with Suitter’s blood, including on the interior of the jacket. Sabine said that Dobbins’ skin cells are on the cuff and the collar of the black jacket. At the same time, Geary’s blood was found in a spot on the back of the jacket, she said. Suitter’s blood also was found on a knife that was found in a hole in the wall in Dobbins’ bedroom, and on a sneaker that Dobbins wore that evening.
Murder suspect Reginald Dobbins, 18, of Houlton appears at Houlton District Court on Monday, March 9, 2015. (BDN File/Nick Sambides Jr.)
According to police testimony and recorded interviews played back for the jury earlier this week, Dobbins said he lent Suitter his jacket on the day of the murder and that Geary is the one who put the knife in the wall of Dobbins’ room. The defense, led by attorney Hunter Tzovarras, got Sabine to acknowledge Thursday that DNA is not always transferred to items, and that Geary’s DNA might not be on the jacket if he was wearing a hooded sweatshirt that evening, as Dobbins said he was.
In a hearing last year, Geary implicated Dobbins as the killer but admitted that he also had “tried to stab” Suitter but instead cut his finger with the knife. Geary said that’s when Dobbins grabbed the knife from him and stabbed Suitter.
Dobbins also told police that he and Geary, whom he repeatedly misnamed as Sam “McGeary” during interviews, had known each other for “two and a half to three years.” That contrasts with Geary’s statement that they had only known each other for a few weeks before the killing.
Justice Hal Stewart II is presiding over the trial that will resume Friday as the prosecutor, Assistant Attorney General John Alsop, continues to present his case.
