The first witnesses took the stand in St. Lawrence County Court Wednesday afternoon in Wayne Oxley's third murder trial, a trial that's expected to bring new witnesses, new testimony and possibly some new evidence.

In her opening statement Wednesday morning, District Attorney Nicole Duve told the 10-woman, two-man jury that Oxley killed Bernard Trickey in Ogdensburg in August 2005 in what she described as an act of rage and vengeance involving drugs.

It was a day, she told the jury, "when all hell broke loose."

There's no question, she said, that it was an intentional act and not an accident. Trickey's bloodied and battered body was found in a recliner in his New York Avenue home.

A bloody bat was later found by police in Oxley's house down the street.

Duve asked the jury to remain open and not speculate as evidence is presented.

In the end, she said, Oxley killed Trickey with a baseball bat. Not just any bat, she said, but his bat.

Defense attorney Peter Dumas painted a different picture. Dumas told the jury the case relies heavily on circumstantial evidence. He said there's no videotape of what happened and no eye witnesses.

Dumas also told the jurors to use what he described as an insurmountable faith in logic to see the amount of reasonable doubt in this case.

"Don't believe the world is flat," he said, "just because they tell you it is."

Oxley continues to maintain he had nothing to do with Trickey's death - that someone else delivered the repeated fatal blows and planted the bat in his cellar.

"I still want to know who murdered John Shannon. I believe the same murderer of Shannon is the same people that murdered Mr. Trickey," said Oxley.

John Shannon, a key prosecution witness and neighbor of both Oxley and Trickey, died in a suspicious fire a few weeks after Trickey's murder.

Police officers who responded to the murder scene inside Bernie Trickey's New York Avenue home were the first to testify Wednesday.

The trial resumes Friday morning.

- reported by John Friot