A lady accused within the 2002 double homicide of her ex-husband and his fiancée is scheduled to face trial for a 3rd time in February, however could also be launched from incarceration for the primary time since her arrest in 2011.
Shawnee County Decide Cheryl Rios diminished Dana Chandler's bond from $1 million to $350,000 on Sept. 29, 4 weeks after her second trial resulted in a hung jury. Chandler would wish not less than $35,000 in money and collateral to cowl the bond and be launched from Shawnee County Jail, the place she has been held for the reason that Kansas Supreme Court docket overturned her first conviction in 2018.
Rios denied a protection movement in search of an acquittal within the case, which stems from the killings of Mike Sisco and Karen Harkness. The pair had been discovered gunned down in Harkness' Topeka residence 20 years in the past.
Rios agreed to permit Chandler to stay along with her nephew about 50 miles away, in Olathe, Kansas, if she pays the bond. Chandler, who will probably be topic to GPS monitoring, is barred from contacting or discussing the case with potential witnesses.
Chandler's protection attorneys declined to touch upon the developments.
Rios additionally granted a change of venue, which might transfer the brand new trial from Shawnee County. Rios cited native information protection the case has acquired when making her choice.
"Given the extreme quantity of media protection from all the native media, I believe it will be troublesome, if not virtually extraordinarily troublesome, if not not possible, to pick out a jury that does not have an opinion about whether or not or not Ms. Chandler is responsible or harmless on this case in Shawnee County," Rios stated.
The brand new trial has been tentatively scheduled for February 6 and is anticipated to final 4 weeks. Within the earlier trial, held in August, the prosecution offered a case centered on circumstantial proof, arguing "jealousy, rage and obsession" led Chandler to kill.
Chandler's protection alleged police bias and incompetence, which it summed up as tunnel imaginative and prescient, missed alternatives and failure to adequately check the restricted forensic proof. In addition they contended that no matter bodily proof existed excluded Chandler.
Sisco, 47, and his fiancée, Harkness, 53, had been every shot a number of instances with a 9 mm weapon on July 7, 2002. Chandler, now 62, was questioned within the rapid aftermath, however wasn't charged at first.
For the subsequent seven years the case acquired publicity as investigators sought info from the general public. "48 Hours" broadcast the present "Haunted" in October 2009, which regarded on the chilly case, together with a 2007 report commissioned by regulation enforcement that concluded that Chandler was, within the view of regulation enforcement, the "main suspect."
She was arrested and entered not responsible pleas to 2 counts of first-degree homicide in 2011. She had been held on one million dollars bail till Rios diminished it. In 2012, after a trial during which her youngsters testified in opposition to her, a Shawnee County jury convicted her on each counts and she or he was sentenced to life in jail. "48 Hours" broadcast a second present, "My Dad's Killer," in September 2012, reporting on the case and Chandler's trial and conviction.
Chandler's conviction was overturned in 2018, when the Kansas Supreme Court docket dominated that proof offered by prosecutor Jacqie Spradling was, in not less than one occasion, "made-up" and "deceptive."
Spradling was disbarred in Could for what the court docket referred to as "insupportable acts of deception."
However the Kansas Supreme Court docket didn't dismiss Chandler's case; as a substitute, it dominated that there was enough proof to retry Chandler. It held that she "had motive and alternative and engaged in suspicious habits after the murders."