Staff Writer

 Winston George was suffocated in the basement of his Old Orchard Beach home as his 13-year-old stepson listened to him struggle to save his life, a prosecutor said Monday during opening statements of a murder trial in York County Superior Court.

Darlene George and her brother, Jeffrey Williams, are charged with murdering Winston George in his Smithwheel Road home on June 20, 2008. They also are charged with conspiracy to commit murder. If convicted, they each face 25 years to life in prison.

Rennie Cassimy, Darlene George’s lover and a tenant in a building she owned in New York, earlier this year pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit murder and is expected to testify for the state.

Assistant Attorney General Leane Zainea told jurors the George marriage was falling apart and each was having an affair. Darlene George developed a plan with Cassimy and Williams to kill her husband during a staged home invasion, she said.

 “As he was struggling to stay alive, Winston George’s 13-year-old stepson Giovanni lay on a bed in the master bedroom tied up and blinded by a pillow,” Zainea said. “Winston George repeatedly begged to know where his family was. Giovanni was held captive on that bed. He was forced to listen as his father struggled to save his life.”

Winston George was found lying on the basement floor, “hog tied” from ankles to neck, strangled with a plastic bag over his head and rum bottle shoved in his mouth, Zainea said.

Darlene George and Cassimy spoke frequently on the phone and traveled together to his native Trinidad, Zainea said. Calls between Williams, Cassimy and Darlene George intensified in the weeks before the murder and Darlene George was the “glue that binds them together,” she said.

Though the state is not required to provide a motive, Zainea said jurors will have it “in spades.”

“It all boils down to this: infidelity,” she said.

Paul Aronson, a defense attorney for Darlene George, disputed Zainea’s assertion that Cassimy and his client were lovers. He said Cassimy is HIV-positive and Darlene George did not want him to visit Maine.

Paul Vincent, Williams’ attorney, did not comment on his client’s role in the case during his opening statement. He asked jurors to remember Williams is innocent until proven guilty and the state must prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.

 According to a 911 call placed by Darlene George at 5:45 a.m. on June 20, 2008, three masked men with guns and knives had tied up her and her son and were ransacking the home. She said her husband came home from work after they were tied up and she didn’t know where he was, she told an emergency dispatcher.

Darlene George later told police the men were wearing stockings over their faces and spoke in fake Jamaican accents. She said they grabbed her son, threw him to the floor and tied him up as she tried to stop them. One man put a knife to her throat and slapped her face as she resisted, she said.

“They kept saying, ‘where’s the (expletive) money? Where’s the drugs,’” she told police.

Darlene George told police she and her son were put in the master bedroom and could hear the men talking in the basement. She thought they were drinking because she heard one say to “pass the bottle,” she told a state police detective in a taped interview. She said there were no drugs in the house and the men took her jewelry, mink coat and laptop computer.

Darlene George also reported a black SUV was missing from the driveway. The car was later found at Captain’s Galley restaurant in Old Orchard Beach, a bloody key in the ignition, according to prosecutors. Prosecutors said Williams and Cassimy took a taxi from the restaurant to a Portland bus terminal before returning to New York the day of the murder.

The trial is expected to continue into next week.

    Following the first day of testimony, Winston George’s older brother said family members will sit through the trial to “see what’s the true story.” Whitfield George of Brooklyn, N.Y., said his family is doing OK considering the unanswered questions about what happened. Their 90-year-old mother is aware Winston George is dead but does not always understand what is happening, he said.

“We think about it every day,” Whitfield George said.

Whitfield George said he and his brother moved from Trinidad to New York at different times, but spent more time together once they were both in the United States. He said Winston George was a hardworking family man.

“He was a calm, quiet kind of guy,” he said. “He occupied himself taking care of his house and family. He didn’t deserve that.”

For updated trial coverage after Courier press time, go to blog.inthecourier.com.