BIDDEFORD — A judge threw out a key piece of evidence that prosecutors believe ties a man to a fatal shooting in Biddeford nearly two years ago: an unfired bullet found among the suspect’s belongings.

The decision came Monday during the trial of Lorenze Labonte, 27, in York County Superior Court. He has been charged with murder in connection with the death of Ahmed Sharif, who was killed Nov. 24, 2023.

Sharif, 27, was staying at the Labonte family’s apartment in Biddeford. Prosecutors said last week they believe Labonte asked two friends to drive him from his apartment in Saco to Biddeford. Prosecutors allege Labonte then shot Sharif and fled to New Bedford, Massachusetts, for the night.

Police still haven’t found the firearm used to kill Sharif, but prosecutors told the jury in opening statements they have an unfired bullet. A detective testified the bullet was in a shoe he obtained during an interview with the defendant’s ex-fiancée.

According to the case’s lead detective, Justin Huntley, police confirmed through testing that the bullet had been cycled through the same gun that left behind a .45 caliber shell casing near Sharif’s body.

Police didn’t obtain the bullet until a month after the shooting, after, Huntley said, Labonte’s ex moved from their home in Saco and was staying at another residence in Auburn. Huntley said he met with her on Dec. 28, 2023, and noticed a pair of shoes and a windbreaker on top of a refrigerator.

Police didn’t obtain the bullet until a month after the shooting, after Labonte’s ex moved from their home in Saco to a new residence in Auburn. Huntley said he met with Labonte’s ex on Dec. 28, 2023, and noticed a pair of shoes and a windbreaker on top of her refrigerator.

Superior Court Justice James Martemucci let Huntley testify, without the jury present, about that meeting. Huntley said he recognized the shoes from pictures police took at Labonte’s house during a search a month earlier.

“And she told me to just take them,” Huntley said.

Labonte’s attorney Verne Paradie said there was too much uncertainty around the shoes and how they got to Auburn. But prosecutors felt the evidence connecting the unfired bullet and the shell casing was relevant.

“They were a match,” Assistant Attorney General Jennifer Ackerman said in court. “They were cycled through the same gun. That this defendant’s fiancée found the unfired bullet is absolutely relevant evidence and should be heard by this jury.”

Martemucci said in court Monday: “There’s too many questions about where it was ultimately first found, who brought it to Auburn, who put the bullet in the sneaker.”

Labonte’s ex was shot and injured in Saco four days after Sharif was shot. Labonte’s sister, Ariana Tito, then 18, pleaded guilty in May and was sentenced to eight years for aggravated elevated assault and witness tampering in connection with the shooting.

Prosecutors haven’t said whether they’ll call on Tito, who was with Sharif when he was shot, but they did call on Labonte’s 10-year-old sister Thursday. The girl told police that Labonte had asked her to leave the home before Sharif was shot.

Detective Martin Royle, with the Maine State Police computer crimes unit, testified Monday that cell phone tower data and text messages provided a rough map of Labonte’s journey to and from the shooting. Last week, two men testified that Labonte called them for a ride to Biddeford and then asked if they could bring him to Massachusetts.

Paradie has scrutinized the two men’s accounts, which were slightly inconsistent from each other, and has suggested Labonte’s youngest sister was “coached.”

On Monday, Paradie cross examined two crime lab analysts about the lack of DNA evidence connecting Labonte to the scene.

A pellet gun found at the crime scene had multiple DNA profiles on it, an analyst testified, but the only profile they could determine belonged to Tito, now 19.

A DNA analyst from the crime lab testified that several other pieces of crime scene evidence weren’t tested for DNA, including cigarette butts found near the Biddeford apartment, an iron bar outside of the window that police have alleged Labonte climbed through and a notebook from Labonte’s home with an apparent shooting reference inside of it.

“I got 2020 vision but this 45 make it hard to see straight,” someone wrote in a notebook, which prosecutors showed the jury pictures of on Friday.

Paradie has questioned whether that was written around the time as the shooting and how the state knows the notebook belonged to Labonte.