GREENLAND — Two days before Cullen Mutrie shot five police officers, killing Chief Michael Maloney, Mutrie's lawyer filed a motion to have drug evidence against his client dismissed, claiming Mutrie was coerced into consenting to a search of his home where anabolic steroids were found.

GREENLAND — Two days before Cullen Mutrie shot five police officers, killing Chief Michael Maloney, Mutrie's lawyer filed a motion to have drug evidence against his client dismissed, claiming Mutrie was coerced into consenting to a search of his home where anabolic steroids were found.



Attorney Stephen Jeffco filed the motion in Rockingham County Superior Court, asking a judge to dismiss all evidence seized from Mutrie's Post Road home on July 24, 2010. According to an affidavit by Greenland Officer Wayne Young, police went to Mutrie's house that day to seize weapons after his then-girlfriend obtained a legal protection order.



While there, according to Young's affidavit, police found steroids inside Mutrie's coffee table.



Mutrie was subsequently indicted by a grand jury for four felony counts of drug possession alleging his possession of Boldenone, Nandrolone, Trenbolone and Stanozolol. The charges were pending on April 14 when, police say, Maloney and four officers from the Attorney General's Drug Task Force were shot by Mutrie after arriving at his home with a no-knock search warrant as part of a new drug investigation.



Two days earlier, the Superior Court received Jeffco's motion arguing that the steroid evidence should be dismissed because Mutrie was arrested for domestic assault without “any real investigation.” Further, Jeffco said, his client was “threatened” by police before agreeing to allowing his home to be searched.



Jeffco wrote to the court that any physical contact Mutrie had with his ex-girlfriend on July 24, 2010 was “justified and reasonable” because Mutrie had “physically stopped” her from keying his new car. She and Mutire had argued, Mutrie asked her to leave, but instead she keyed his car, locked herself in her car and called Greenland police, according to Jeffco's motion.



Mutrie was subsequently arrested for simple assault and the ex-girlfriend received an emergency a protection order that included judicial instructions ordering Mutrie to “relinquish” all weapons. But, according to Jeffco's motion, Mutrie wasn't allowed to surrender his weapons after being released on personal recognizance bail. Instead, Jeffco's motion states, Officer Young “threatened to kick (Mutrie's) door down” and hold him in jail until he agreed to sign a consent for the search.



Jeffco argued that Mutrie's state and federal constitutional rights were breached and he told the court prosecutors had the burden to prove Mutrie's consent to a search was “free of duress and coercion.”



The Portsmouth lawyer asked the court to schedule a hearing on his motion to suppress all evidence in advance of a trial that was scheduled for Sept. 24.



Mutrie, who would have been 30 on Friday, killed himself after shooting the police officers, according to the state Attorney General's office. He was found dead in his basement with Brittany Tibbetts of Maine, who police said conspired with Mutrie to sell “upward of 500 oxycodone pills every few days.”



Mutrie was barred from possessing weapons and/or a license to carry a concealed weapon as a result of a domestic violence conviction. A Ruger .357 revolver found in his home after the shootings was bought by Tibbetts at a Manchester gun show, said Associate Attorney General Jane Young.



The source of a 9 mm pistol, also found at the scene, has not yet been identified, Young said.



According to the AG's office, ballistics tests, interviews and the overall investigation remain ongoing.