Published: July 22, 2008 09:04 pm         

Judge resets sentencing trial for convicted murderer for third time

LEWISBURG — Convicted murderer Billy Ray McLaughlin’s trial has been rescheduled for a third time.

Senior Status Judge Frank E. Jolliffe, during a hearing Tuesday, reset the trial for Oct. 21. The trial, which only involves the sentencing phase of McLaughlin’s 1996 murder conviction, has been beset with problems of missing key evidence.

Pre-trial testimony Tuesday focused on an audio tape that McLaughlin’s lawyers desperately want to get their hands on to prove that their client was too intoxicated to understand his Miranda rights on the day he was arrested.

Despite several witnesses, including an EMT who records showed handed the tape recorder over to authorities to use while interrogating McLaughlin, the tape can not be located.

Also, a toxicologist from the state’s Medical Examiner’s Office testified that samples of blood and tissue from the 1994 murder could not be located and were most likely destroyed. Such samples were destroyed “because of a policy” after a 10-year-period, she said. She also believed that the current policy has been changed and blood and tissue samples are kept indefinitely or until a prosecutor asks them to be destroyed.

A jury found that McLaughlin, after a night of drinking in 1994, shot his wife in the face four times with a .22 revolver and in the chest with a .207 rifle during a domestic dispute. A family member found McLaughlin was found passed out on a couch beside his dead wife.

The venue was changed to Greenbrier County because of pretrial publicity.

— E-mail: cgiggenbach@register-herald.com