BANGOR – Gage and Derek Greene of Biddeford were drunk when they were shot to death by a neighbor last year, a deputy medical examiner testified Thursday in the murder trial of Rory Holland.

Gage Greene, 19, died almost immediately from a single chest wound, said Dr. Fred Jordan of the state Medical Examiner’s Office. Derek Greene, 21, was shot three times and died before he reached Maine Medical Center in Portland.

Both men were intoxicated and tested positive for small levels of marijuana, Jordan said on the witness stand in the Penobscot Judicial Center.

Holland, 56, is accused of killing the two young men outside his home on June 30, 2009. He says he did it in self-defense.

During the trial, which began Monday, defense attorney Clifford Strike has tried to paint a picture for the jury in which Holland was surrounded on the street that night by aggressive young men who had been drinking beer, vodka and whiskey, and felt that deadly force was his only way out.

Derek Greene had been arrested and charged with assaulting Holland five weeks earlier, and had a bail condition to stay away from him.

The jury will have to decide whether Holland was a victim of neighborhood racial tension or the aggressor.

Prosecutors contend that Holland didn’t like the Greene brothers and could simply have retreated into his home for his own safety.

Their case included testimony Thursday by Maine State Police detectives who said that in a search of Holland’s home after the shootings, they found a Maine legal reference book that was tabbed to a page defining the right of a person to kill another in self-defense and in the right state of mind.

Holland has become well known in Biddeford over the years, running for mayor twice, filing lawsuits against the city and the police department, and reporting that he was assaulted because he is African-American.

The case was moved to Penobscot County because of Holland’s notoriety in York County and his attorneys’ concern that he could not get a fair trial there.

Holland and the Greene brothers lived in separate homes in the same neighborhood at the time of the shootings.

Eyewitnesses who were close friends of the Greene brothers say Holland was standing on the sidewalk outside his home with a loaded gun at 1 a.m. and shot Gage Greene when he confronted Holland.

Derek Greene was running toward his wounded brother from the other side of the street when he was shot.

The gun that prosecutors say was used to kill the Greene brothers was entered into evidence Thursday.

State police detectives testified that they found the gun hidden on the roof of the second story of Holland’s home.

 

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