AUGUSTA

Autopsy performed on North Waterboro teen

The state’s chief medical examiner performed an autopsy Monday on a 15-year-old North Waterboro boy whose disappearance May 8 launched a massive volunteer search.

The Office of Chief Medical Examiner has released no findings yet in its inquiry into the death of Jaden Dremsa, whose body was found by wardens Saturday in Lake Arrowhead. The lake alongside North Waterboro is part of the town of Limerick.

After Dremsa disappeared, hundreds of volunteers, most of whom did not know the boy personally, turned out to search for him – walking through miles of woods around where he lived at Twin Pines Trailer Park. Wardens also used planes, helicopters and boats to search the lake last week but did not find him until Saturday.

Dremsa had been seen down near the shore the day he disappeared, but it is not known how he came to be in the water.

The Office of Chief Medical Examiner will rule on the cause and manner of Dremsa’s death.

BANGOR

Suspect in car fire blames killings on co-defendant

One of two men accused of killing three people and burning their bodies after a drug dispute blamed the killings on his co-defendant in testimony Monday.

Nicholas Sexton of Warwick, Rhode Island, and Randall Daluz of Brockton, Massachusetts, shot and killed the three victims before setting them ablaze in a car in a Bangor parking lot in 2012, prosecutors said.

Sexton testified that Daluz shot Lucas Tuscano and Daniel Borders while they were driving near Orono and shot Nicolle Lugdon while parked on a dirt road in Hermon, WZON-AM reported. Sexton also testified that Daluz ordered him to burn the car in Bangor.

Tuscano was from Bradford, Borders from Hermon and Lugdon from Eddington.

The station also reported that Sexton wept on the witness stand while describing Lugdon as a friend.

He said he went along with Daluz’s plan to burn the car because Daluz threatened him and his family if he didn’t do it.

“I was scared,” Sexton said. “I didn’t know what to do.”

Daluz’s defense attorneys said in court that Sexton called Daluz more than a dozen times the day after the killings, indicating that he wasn’t scared of Daluz.

Sexton may return to the stand Tuesday, attorneys said.

Daluz’s defense team is expected to present its case after Sexton’s defense rests, possibly Tuesday. Closing arguments could follow Tuesday or Wednesday, prosecutors said.

Daluz and Sexton are charged with three counts of murder and one count of starting a fire. They each face a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted.

The trial opened May 1 at the Penobscot Judicial Center in Bangor. The prosecution rested Friday.