Suspect in 2016 Portland murder returns to Maine, pleads not guilty
Feb. 26—A former South Portland resident pleaded not guilty Friday to charges that he shot two men, killing one of them, in Portland nearly five years ago.
Aristotle Stilley, 24, was indicted in Maine last August and arrested in Sacramento, California after a routine traffic stop in October. California officials insisted that he serve a sentence for misdemeanor methamphetamine possession in that state before allowing him to be sent back to Maine on the murder charge.
Stilley was brought to Maine this week and arraigned by a video appearance in Cumberland County Court in Portland Friday afternoon. He entered not guilty pleas to murder and aggravated assault and the court appointed a lawyer for him. He is accused of killing 36-year-old David Anderson and assaulting Abdirahman Abdullahi when he fired a gun through the door of a Portland apartment March 15, 2016.
While previous court filings had described the allged killing of Anderson, information about the shooting of Abdullahi was not disclosed before Friday's court appearance. The newly revealed assault charge said only that the Abdullahi shooting occurred in Cumberland County on the same date that Anderson was shot and killed, and was committed with a .40-caliber Hi Point pistol.
Leann Robbin, an assistant attorney general, said Abdullahi was hit with a bullet at the same time that Stilley allegedly shot through the door and killed Anderson. She declined to say what might have been the motive or whether Stilley, Anderson and Abdullahi knew each other, and how.
Portland Police officials said Friday they had no more information on the aggravated assault charge and they have disclosed little about the Anderson killing.
State officials at Friday's arraignment indicated they will probably seek a hearing that would allow them to continue to hold Stilley without bail, but a date for that hearing wasn't set Friday.
Anderson was shot after someone knocked on the door of an apartment at 88 Gilman Street shortly after 11 p.m. Several shots were fired through the closed door, killing Anderson, who was a guest at the apartment, and hitting Abdullahi. Two other guests and the resident of the apartment were unharmed, Robbin said.
It's not clear why it took four years to identify Stilley as a suspect, or what evidence led to the charges.
Police said the apartment complex had video cameras, but the gunman covered his face with a mask and a hood. The gunman also picked up the brass shell casings ejected from the semi-automatic handgun used in the shooting, leaving little evidence at the site for police.
Stilley was indicted by a Cumberland County Grand Jury last August and a warrant was issued for his arrest. After he was stopped by police in California early last fall and served time there, Portland police went to California this week to bring him back to Maine.
The indictment was sealed and Police have not said what led them to suspect Stilley in the shooting or what the motive might have been. No further details on the shooting were released in court Friday.
Until recently, Anderson's killing had been listed among more than a dozen unsolved homicides in the city. There are now 14 cases with brief descriptions on a web site that police maintain and they ask anyone who might have information on the cases to call (207) 874-8575 or leave an anonymous tip at 207-874-8584.
