Story Created:
Feb 19, 2010 at 5:50 PM CDT
Story Updated:
Feb 19, 2010 at 6:36 PM CDT
Gerald Carnahan will stand trial in September for the 1985 murder of Jackie Johns, a judge in St. Louis ruled Friday.
But that date could slip because Carnahan's lead attorney is recovering from cancer surgery.
Carnahan is charged with first-degree murder and rape in the death of Johns. She was 20 when she vanished after leaving work in Nixa in June 1985. Her body was found several days later in Lake Springfield.
Carnahan was arrested in 2007, after police said they found a DNA match to evidence in the cold case.
Friday, attorneys for both sides held a telephone news conference with a judge in St. Louis, where the case is being heard on a change of venue from Greene County.
The judge set Sept. 13, 2010, as the start of the trial. But Greene County Prosecutor Darrell Moore cautioned against putting that date in stone.
Much depends on how well defense attorney Dee Wampler recovers from surgery for prostate and kidney cancer, Moore says.
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