NEWPORT — A Newport man who was shot during a dispute between neighbors over a shared driveway last summer likely won’t testify at his alleged shooter’s upcoming trial. That’s left attorneys to argue over what evidence the jury should be allowed to hear in the victim’s absence.

Kevin Nottage III, who was shot in the leg during the incident in July 2019, has since moved to Florida and is “not available or willing” to attend the trial of his former neighbor, Oliver Renehan, according to a motion filed by Renehan’s defense attorney Cabot Teachout earlier this month.

Renehan, 59, is scheduled to stand trial Feb. 4 on two counts of first-degree assault and one count of reckless conduct.

Renehan allegedly fired two shots, one of which struck the 24-year-old Nottage outside their homes on the 200 block of South Main Street on July 24.

Renehan has maintained that he fired the shots — the other went into Nottage’s home — in an act similar to self-defense: to stop a fight that was happening between Nottage’s aunt, Valerie Ellsey, and Renehan’s fiancee, Paula Cain, in the shared driveway.

Police have said the incident followed a long history of property disputes between the two families, the latest being an argument over toy boats in the driveway.

In the motion this month, Teachout argued that the court should admit into evidence a digitally recorded interview that New Hampshire State Police conducted with Nottage shortly after the shooting.

During the interview, Nottage said Ellsey was assaulting Cain just before the shooting and that both he and Renehan got involved, according to the defense motion.

Nottage also told police that he pushed Renehan away from the altercation before Renehan fired the shot that hit him in the leg, the motion said.

“Each of these facts show that Mr. Renehan took his actions only to cease and deter the ongoing unlawful assaults by both Nottage and Ellsey,” Teachout wrote in the motion, adding that the interview shows Renehan’s actions were “legally justified.”

Teachout also argued that the interview should be exempt from the hearsay rule because it’s trustworthy, and because locating Nottage and getting his in-person testimony at the hearing would be costly and a “waste of time” for the court.

“(The interview) was audio recorded by police and its accuracy cannot be disputed,” Teachout wrote.

But Sullivan County Attorney Marc Hathaway disagreed.

In a response to Teachout’s motion Tuesday, Hathaway argued that the interview between Nottage and police isn’t evidence that Renehan acted in self-defense.

“The facts predicating the defendant’s thoughts and his thought process should not be inferred from the hearsay statements of a witness not being subjected to cross-examination,” Hathaway wrote.

He also stressed that the interview is “clearly” a case of hearsay and shouldn’t be admitted at trial.

“There are multiple other eyewitnesses who potentially are available to testify to what they saw, heard or perceived concerning the same events,” he wrote.

The state plans to call both Cain and Ellsey to testify at the trial, according to a witness list submitted this month.

Anna Merriman can be reached at amerriman@vnews.com or 603-727-3216