Court dates for the three remaining Explo officials indicted on charges related to the Camp Minden explosion in 2012 have been moved again.
According to court documents, the court date for David Fincher, 65, of Burns, Tennessee, and David Smith, 57, of Winchester, Kentucky, has been continued until Monday, Sept. 28. The court date for the remaining defendant, William Terry Wright, 59, of Bossier City, will be Monday, Oct. 26.
The dates are for hearings in front of 26th Judicial District Judges Mike Craig and Mike Nerren on three different issues: a motion to quash, a motion to change venue and a motion for a bill of particulars.
Court documents show the motion to quash for all three defendants is one to suppress based on their argument the M6 material is not an “explosive” and therefore not subject to all the regulations.
The motion to change venue for all three defendants was filed because they believe they “cannot receive a fair trial because since the alleged incident the local media has published numerous articles and news coverage about this incident in a highly inflammatory nature,” the motion reads in part.
The motion regarding the bill of particulars – a more specific bill of information on all the charges – asks the state (i.e. District Attorney Schuyler Marvin) to “furnish a bill of particulars identifying those items provided in discovery the State
alleges are explosive materials that were unlawfully stored.”
The defense goes on to ask for a bill of particulars on the charges of explosive materials that were not properly marked, properly inventoried and a bill of particulars “stating whether scientific tests have been conducted on any of the alleged explosive material so identified…”
Reasons for the continuance of the hearings were not released in the court documents; however, in a previous edition of the Minden Press-Herald, Marvin says trying to get all the expert witnesses together on one date is proving to be difficult.
“It’s complicated enough trying to get our experts from the Army and the ATF and get them all to agree to be here on a certain date,” Marvin said in April. “We’re doing all that now, and it’s a complicated case.”
The above named defendants were charged with unlawful storage of explosives, criminal conspiracy to commit unlawful storage of explosives, reckless storage of explosives, criminal conspiracy to commit reckless storage of explosives, failure to obtain magazine license, criminal conspiracy to commit failure to obtain magazine license, failure to properly mark explosive material, criminal conspiracy to commit failure to properly mark explosive material, failure to keep accurate inventory and criminal conspiracy to commit failure to keep accurate inventory.
Three other defendants, Lionel Koons, Todd Dietrich and Michael Kile all pled guilty to misdemeanor charges.
Dietrich pled guilty to reckless handling of explosives. He was fined $1,000 plus court costs, must pay restitution of $1,000 to the Louisiana State Police and must serve two years active supervised probation. He was sentenced August 23, 2013.
Koons pled guilty to careless handling of explosives. He was fined $1,000 plus $1,000 in restitution to the state police and two years active supervised probation. He was sentenced August 23, 2013.
Kile pled guilty to careless use of explosives. He must pay $1,000 fine plus $1,000 to offset the cost of prosecution, placed on supervised probation but will consider unsupervised probation after eight months. He was sentenced Oct. 25, 2013.
All three entered guilty pleas in exchange for the misdemeanor charges and that they testify against Fincher, Smith and Wright. The three are also prohibited from employment by any company that has anything to do with explosives.