The Crown has laid out its case for the jury in the murder trial of a Dartmouth man accused of killing a cab driver more than three years ago.  

Wayne MacEvoy, the cousin of the accused, is expected to be the main witness in the case.

“We’ve spoken to the cousin and we have a good sense of what he will say,” says Crown prosecutor Eric Taylor.

Chaze Lamar Thompson, 22, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder in the death of Dartmouth cab driver Sergei Kostin, a 40-year-old native of Ukraine.

Kostin was killed in January 2009 after he picked up a fare at a convenience store in Dartmouth.

Marlene Holden met Sergei Kostin when he first arrived in Canada in the early 1990s.

“He came here for such a better life and he didn’t get it,” she says.

Kostin drove a cab for Bob’s Taxi and Holden says he often spoke about being scared driving a cab.

“He was just constantly afraid that each fare would be his last fare and he wouldn’t get paid and he wouldn’t have the money to send home to his family,” she says.

Today marked day one of the murder trial and the jury learned about Kostin’s last day at work.

The manager of Bob’s Taxi testified the cab’s tracking system showed Kostin had 23 fares the day he disappeared. His last pickup was at a Dartmouth convenience store just before 3:30 p.m. and the last GPS update was at 3:44 p.m.

“Thankfully the wonders of GPS allow people to be tracked, especially taxi drivers, on a daily basis,” says Taylor. “I think some GPS (devices) will track cars every five minutes.”

Kostin’s cab was found burned out in North Preston a few days after he disappeared, although his body wasn’t recovered until April, about a kilometre away from the car.

Thompson was charged with first-degree murder in January 2010, a year after Kostin’s death.

According to the Crown, MacEvoy is expected to tell the jury that he and Thompson called a cab to take them to Cherry Brook in January 2009 and that Thompson was in the backseat of the vehicle when he fired a single shot to the head, killing Kostin.

He is then expected to testify that he and Thompson drove the cab to a deserted street, left Kostin’s body and later abandoned the cab.

Holden says she still has questions about Kostin’s death, but for now she is remembering a friend.

“He was educated, warm, a really good human being.”

The Crown is expected to call about 20 witnesses to the stand. Thompson is scheduled to stand trial over the next six weeks.

With files from CTV Atlantic's Jacqueline Foster