Man pleads no contest in Donald Giusti's death in a 2018 melee
Sep. 13—PORTLAND — A former Lewiston man pleaded no contest Tuesday to criminal negligence manslaughter in the 2018 death of Donald Giusti near Kennedy Park in Lewiston.
Emmanuel Nkurunziza, now 21, threw a rock during a melee that apparently struck 38-year-old Donald Giusti in the head.
Nkurunziza agreed Tuesday to a 10-year sentence, with all but 9 months of that time suspended, after meeting with a judge and prosecutors in Cumberland County Superior Court just prior to what had been scheduled as a hearing on a suppression motion filed by the defendant.
By entering a so-called Alford plea, Nkurunziza agreed that the evidence prosecutors would be able to present at trial could result in a guilty verdict, but Nkurunziza said through an interpreter that he disputes some of the facts prosecutors said they had planned to present.
The judge accepted his plea.
Nkurunziza, who came to this country from a Rwandan refugee camp, would have faced deportation had he pleaded guilty to a manslaughter charge that included the element of reckless behavior, his attorney, George Hess, told Justice Michaela Murphy Tuesday.
By having prosecutors remove language referencing "reckless" behavior from the manslaughter charge, Nkurunziza is unlikely to face deportation, Hess said. Prosecutors also agreed to dismiss a charge of aggravated assault in the case as well as a simple assault charge stemming from an altercation while Nkurunziza was incarcerated.
Although he has agreed to serve nine months in jail, he will be credited for the time he served at the Long Creek Youth Development Center in South Portland as well as short stints at county jails in Auburn and Portland before he was released on bail with an electronic monitor.
His sentencing has been scheduled for Thursday.
Nkurunziza was arrested in April 2019 and charged with manslaughter as a juvenile.
An 8th District Court judge heard arguments in July 2019 whether the then-teen should be bound over from juvenile to adult court, ruling in September 2019 that he should be tried as an adult.
A grand jury indicted him in November 2019 on charges of manslaughter and aggravated assault.
Nkurunziza had turned 17 about a month before the June 12, 2018, nighttime melee on Knox Street when Giusti was apparently struck by a rock and knocked to the pavement. He died three days later from blunt-force trauma to his head and torso, according to a medical examiner.
Witnesses said a group of largely Somali youth clashed that night with more than a dozen white men, including Giusti, who had congregated in Kennedy Park.
Police said Nkurunziza admitted to having thrown a rock but hadn't seen where it landed. A witness has said he saw Nkurunziza throw the rock and saw it hit Giusti on the head. Two police officers who viewed videos of the scene that night identified Nkurunziza as the person who threw an object that appeared to have felled Giusti.
