ROCKLAND, Maine — A Maine State Prison inmate who is accused of brutally murdering another prisoner by stabbing him 87 times and planning to kill a guard is scheduled to make a court appearance Friday in an effort to get more records from the state.
Richard Stahursky, also known as Richard Clement, is asking the court to order the prison to turn over his medical records and also the personnel file of the corrections officer that the state alleges he planned to murder.
Stahursky, 36, claims that both sets of records could be used in his defense.
The prisoner claims in his latest motion that he was transferred over his objections to the “B-Pod,” a section of the prison that includes inmates serving time for sex offenses. Stahursky said he had voiced his dislike of sex offenders to prison officials.
Stahursky is charged with murder, attempted murder and possession of prison contraband, which in this case was a homemade knife known as a shank, according to court documents. The motion to obtain the records was filed by attorney Philip Cohen.
Cohen took over defense of Stahursky more than two months ago after the state prisoner claimed he was fearful his prior attorney Christopher MacLean of Camden was trying to kill him. MacLean dismissed those claims.
“I have represented quite a few murder defendants over the years, but this is the first murder plot I have been implicated in. The state police have not been around to interview me yet, but as an experienced criminal defense attorney, I will know exactly how to handle the situation if they do,” MacLean said in a September statement.
Stahursky was indicted in April in connection with the Feb. 28 slaying of 37-year-old Micah Boland at the prison in Warren. Boland had served six years of a 22-year sentenced imposed in 2008 in Waldo County Superior Court for gross sexual assault. The victim in that case was a 4-year-old girl in Liberty.
Stahursky confessed to the killing and claimed he wouldn’t plead not guilty by reason of insanity because he knew what he was doing, according to an affidavit filed in March by Maine State Police Detective Jason Andrews.
The affidavit stated that Stahursky stabbed Boland 87 times and beat him in Boland’s cell. Stahursky claimed that he sought out Boland after conducting his own investigation within the prison to find out who made allegations that he improperly passed items from one prison pod to another living area. Stahursky said the false allegations cost him his job as a hallway worker.
When he was apprehended in Boland’s death, he allegedly had another homemade knife and had labeled it as the weapon he was going to use to kill a corrections officer. Stahursky claims in his latest motion that the personnel file of the guard could be relevant to his defense.
Stahursky originally was sentenced in 2002 to nearly 20 years in prison for an armed robbery of a Mainway convenience store in Fort Fairfield. At the time of that robbery, he also was wanted by police in Connecticut on a larceny charge.
He was convicted of two separate stabbings of inmates with shanks prior to 2012 and for arson in 2004 for setting a fire at the prison.
Stahursky was sentenced in December 2012 to an additional eight years in prison for assaulting a guard. At that time, Stahursky asked Justice Jeffrey Hjelm to impose the maximum 10 years.