HARRIS COUNTY, Texas – David Temple was released from prison two years ago after an appeals court ruled he didn't get a fair trial.
Now, he's facing retrial for the alleged murder of his wife, a popular Katy teacher.
At a hearing Monday morning, Temple's attorney argued that the murder charge should be thrown out.
Defense attorney Stanley Schneider asked the judge to dismiss the murder charge, arguing that a retrial constitutes double jeopardy for Temple, and that special prosecutors in the case had not complied with the speedy trial act.
Double jeopardy means that a defendant can't be tried twice for the same crime.
Temple, a former football coach at Alief Hastings High School, was sentenced to life in prison in 2007 for the murder of his pregnant wife, Belinda, eight years earlier. She was shot with a shotgun as she cowered in a closet of their Katy home.
Temple was released in 2016 after an appeals court threw out his conviction, finding that prosecutors had not turned over all the evidence in the case before the trial.
It’s been two years since Temple’s conviction was overturned, but special prosecutor Lisa Tanner said her team is still going through thousands of pages of evidence generated by the trial and appeal.
Judge Kelli Johnson said she’ll delay, for now, ruling on the speedy trial argument, but denied the defense motion to dismiss the murder charge based on double jeopardy.
“It’s double jeopardy, but precedent is against us," Schneider said.
The judge did grant a defense motion not to admit as evidence gunshot residue collected during the initial investigation. The same evidence wasn’t allowed in 2007 trial.
Temple’s new trial is scheduled to start in February.