By: ELIZABETH WEST
Associate Editor
On Tuesday, Larry Slaughter appeared before Judge Chuck West for a motion hearing where his attorney Jacob Fusilier requested that Judge Gary Ortego be recused from presiding over Slaughter’s upcoming trial for second degree murder.
Slaughter was arrested back in January of 2015 after he was accused of killing 29-year-old Latoya Richard, who was found dead in her home on High School Drive in Ville Platte with her head in a bucket of water.
The defendant’s motion was made due to the fact that he and his counsel felt it was a conflict of interest that one of the witnesses in the trial is the nephew of Ortego’s baliff Gene Lavigne.
However, Ortego has two baliffs. Therefore, West denied the motion and ordered that Ortego’s other baliff Tony Soileau work court during the trial.
Slaughter then appeared before Judge Ortego requesting that his April 17, 2017 trial date be pushed back.
The reason for the request, according to the defendant’s attorney, was because the defense needs to file a motion in federal court to have former Ville Platte Police Officer Nathaniel Savoy, who is currently serving a federal prison sentence for falsifying police documents, transported to Evangeline Parish to testify in the trial.
Ortego granted the defense their request.
Slaughter’s probing has been set for June 15, 2017 with his trial date re-set for June 19th.