Darren Winans and Matthew Laurin will be tried separately, but a trial date still hasn’t been set after a hearing on Monday.
Defense attorneys say they are waiting for the Jasper County Prosecutor’s Office to file aggravating circumstances against the two that would bring the death penalty to play in the case.
Defense attorneys said if the aggravating circumstances are filed, new attorneys may be assigned to the cases.
Assistant Prosecutor Norman Rouse said aggravating circumstances will likely be filed in the next two weeks.
Winans, 22, Jasper, and Laurin, 20, Springfield are charged with first-degree murder in the Oct. 11, 2008 slayings of Bob and Ellen Sheldon, Carthage.
The two men also face charges of armed criminal action and burglary in the case.
The two, with their attorneys, public defender Brandi McInroy, for Winans and Chris Hatley, for Laurin, along with Rouse, appeared before Judge Gail Crane on Monday to hear her decision on a motion to separate the two cases.
Crane assigned the two men separate case numbers and ruled their cases would be tried separately.
Crane and the three attorneys discussed possible trial dates in the hearing, but no date was set.
Crane said she hadn’t decided where the juries would come from either, but attorneys from both sides agreed that jury pools from adjoining counties could be tainted by the publicity the case has drawn the same way people from Jasper County are likely tainted.
Crane ruled in November that the cases would be tried in Jasper County but jurors would be brought in from another county to hear the evidence.
Bob Sheldon, 70, and his wife, Ellen Sheldon, 71, were found dead in their homes of multiple stab wounds early in the morning on Oct. 12. Their youngest son, Daniel Sheldon, found the couple in their home on Black Powder Lane west of Carthage.
Investigators said the two were murdered during an attempted burglary at their home.
Crane set another hearing date for Jan. 25, 2010.
Winans and Laurin were arrested in July after a nine-month investigation that left investigators and the Sheldon family frustrated at an apparent lack of leads.
Winans and Laurin remain in custody in the Jasper County Jail.
