Portsmouth officer testifies in stabbing trial

PORTSMOUTH

Franklin Lancaster Sr., 75, died a violent death in a place most people would have considered the safest spot in the city.

He was in the basement of a building that houses a police headquarters and General District Court, a place where police officers and deputies constantly come and go.

One of those officers did get to Lancaster as he lay on the floor dying.

On Monday, Officer John Kirk testified that he had been at his desk in a nearby room on the morning of Nov. 13 when he heard a commotion and yelling near the magistrate's office.

He said it grew louder and he heard a couple of thumps and went to see what was going on.

The officer identified the defendant - Michael Lancaster, 55 - as the man he saw standing there, blood "dripping from both hands."

Franklin Lancaster's son.

Monday was the first day of the trial for Michael Lancaster, who is charged with first-degree murder.

Kirk testified that he saw the younger man drop a knife handle and that he saw the father, lying on the floor, gasping for air.

"Blood was everywhere," he said.

The blade of the knife was later removed from the victim's body by the medical examiner, who also recovered what appeared to be a fragment of the blade in the victim's cheek.

A forensic scientist testified that she was able to match the fragment to the knife blade.

The defendant's sister, Angelia Clack, testified that her brother told her he was going to kill his father because he did not lend him money.

Lancaster died of the wounds to his head and neck, according to an autopsy. The victim also had wounds on his arm as though he had tried to ward off the attack, a medical examiner testified.

Detective Mark Luck said he did not observe any bruises, scrapes or marks on the son.

In an opening statement, though, one of Michael Lancaster's lawyers, Chad Dorsk, told jurors that his client and his father had a "tumultuous relationship."

He said the legal team would present facts that would show their client took the knife from his father and acted in self-defense.

On Monday, jurors heard only the witnesses for the commonwealth. Defense attorneys will present their case today.

Janie Bryant, (757) 446-2453, janie.bryant@pilotonline.com