PORTLAND — Almost three years after a Biddeford man was shot to death in the parking lot of an apartment building on Birch Street, a trial for the three men charged with his murder is scheduled to begin this fall.

Jury selection is scheduled to begin

Nov. 4, and, if necessary, continue to Nov. 7, according to documents filed at Cumberland

County

Superior

Court in

Portland.

A trial is scheduled to begin on the first business day after jury selection ends and continue through

Nov. 23.

During the early hours of March 26, 2013, 47-year-old Charles Raybine was shot in the face three times while sitting inside a rental car in the parking lot of Parish Place apartments. Police have said the shooting was drugrelated.

Bub Peter Nguany, 28, of Old Orchard Beach, was the first to be charged in connection with the slaying.

Nguany was arrested the morning of the shooting as he attempted to leave an apartment on East Grand Avenue in a taxi. Police later searched his backpack, and discovered a .45-caliber handgun with ammunition matching shell casings recovered from the crime scene. Nguany was charged with murder in June 2013, and his trial was scheduled to start in May 2015.

In April 2015, police also charged John Lopez, 21, of Old Orchard Beach, and Mohamud Mohamed, 22, of Portland, with murder in connection with the shooting.

The case was originally being heard at York County Superior Court, but was moved to Portland in January because of a lack of space at the Alfred courthouse.

When asked in an email Thursday if a more challenging or time-consuming trial is expected because there are three defendants, Timothy Feeley, a spokesman for the Attorney General’s Office, said, “It is our practice not to comment on pending cases.”

One matter that must be resolved before the trial begins is Mohamed’s motion to suppress evidence obtained through what his attorney maintains was an illegal search of his cellphone.

Although Mohamed was not charged with Raybine’s murder until 2015, he was arrested just hours after the shooting, after police surrounded him as he stood on the porch of an East Grand Avenue apartment that Nguany had been seen entering earlier.

In court documents dated Feb. 23, Mohamed’s attorney, Thomas Hallett, argues that his client was arrested – and his cellphone subsequently searched – without probable cause. Therefore, he maintains, the evidence obtained through that search should not be used in the trial.

“There was no reasonable basis to detain Mohamed because there was no probable cause to believe that he was committing a crime, or had committed a crime, beyond the guilt-by-association imputed to him because he had been seen in the same house as a suspect in an ongoing investigation,” Hallett wrote.

At a hearing on the motion in November, several police officers testified that Mohamed was arrested to ensure officer safety and as a “person of interest,” because they believed more than one person had been involved in the shooting.

According to court documents, Raybine’s nephew, who was sitting next to him when he was shot, told police he saw two vehicles pull up to the parking lot before the shooter exited one of them.

Feeley said the motion to suppress is expected to be resolved by the end of March.

— Staff Writer Angelo J. Verzoni can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 329 or averzoni@journaltribune.com.

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