A St. Charles County judge has granted additional time for defense attorneys to prepare for the trial of Shawn Kavanagh, who is accused of stabbing three people to death in 2014.St. Charles Circuit Judge Ted C. House Tuesday ordered that the trial be rescheduled for three weeks in May 2020.Attorneys with the Missouri Public Defender’s Office requested that a Jan. 7, 2020, date for the murder trial be postponed because one of the two lawyers representing Kavanagh is retiring in October.Kavanagh, 28, of Bellflower, is accused in the deaths of Tara Lynn Fifer, 22, of Montgomery City, Lexy Vandiver, 29, and her son, Mason Vandiver, 7, both of Jonesburg. He also is accused of severely wounding his estranged wife, Jessica N. Powel.Kavanagh has pleaded not guilty to nine felony charges: three counts of first-degree murder, four counts of armed criminal action, and single charges of first-degree domestic assault and first-degree burglary. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.St. Charles Circuit Judge Ted C. House heard arguments for and against postponement Sept. 27. He took the defense’s request under advisement, and ordered attorneys from both sides to submit dates that they wouldn’t be available for trial in 2020.On Tuesday, House ordered for jury selection to be moved to the week of May 4, 2020. The main portion of the trial is set to begin May 11, 2020.Kavanagh is incarcerated at the St. Charles County Department of Corrections.This is the seventh time Kavanagh’s murder trial has been delayed. Most of the cancellations have been due to numerous difficulties and turnover within the state public defender’s office. Kavanagh is being represented by a division of public defenders that specifically handle capital punishment cases.Kavanagh has consistently had two attorneys assigned to his case. In early September, defense attorney Robert Lundt announced that he will retire at the end of October due to prolonged illness.Lundt is the only attorney who has been consistently assigned to Kavanagh’s case since 2014. Several co-counsels have left the public defender’s office before Kavanagh’s case went to trial, causing delays as new defenders were brought in and went through the lengthy process of preparing for trial.Similarly, this most recent request to postpone the trial was so a new attorney could have adequate time to review thousands of documents and recordings involved in the case.“It is unrealistic to expect any attorney, particularly one who has no capital litigation experience, to be prepared to try a triple-murder death penalty case with 2 1/2 months to prepare,” defense co-counsel David Kenyon wrote to the court.Kenyon said he also needs time to familiarize himself with and contact over 40 witnesses who may be called to help defend Kavanagh from a death penalty sentence if he is convicted. That had been attorney Lundt’s role before he announced his retirement.Lengthy Trial DelaysThere has been a history of delays and continuances in bringing Kavanagh to trial, several times after turnover on the defense team.Defense attorneys have asserted in court filings that without adequate time for both attorneys to be fully prepared for trial and any subsequent sentencing hearings, there may be grounds to rule that Kavanagh did not receive his constitutional guarantee of an effective defense counsel. Such a finding could put any conviction at risk of being overturned on appeal and being sent back for a new trial.Even so, prosecutors have consistently objected to moving the trial date.The first trial date for Kavanagh was scheduled to begin in October 2016 in Montgomery County. That trial was canceled three months ahead of time.The next date set for the murder trial was in January 2017 in Warren County, which was then pushed back to April 2017. But that date was canceled after the defense sought a change of venue, arguing that a fair trial couldn’t be had in the Warren County area, according to court records.Cape Girardeau County was identified as the new venue for the trial, and it was rescheduled for October 2017. All of this scheduling and rescheduling of the trial date took place in 2016.Then in January 2017, Robert Steele, one of Kavanagh’s attorneys, withdrew from the case and left the public defender’s office. In June 2017, public defenders asked for the trial to be postponed because replacement attorney Tara Crane had less than six months to prepare. The trial was then moved to September 2018.But that trial date was scuttled when defense attorney Robert Lundt became seriously ill the week before the trial. Lundt told the court that he had not slept in two days and was seeking medical treatment for severe stomach issues.Once again, the trial date was moved, this time to June 2019. Then in early 2019, the defense requested a new judge after former Audrain County Prosecutor Jason Lamb was elected as presiding judge of the 12th Circuit Court. St. Charles 11th Circuit Judge Ted House was assigned to the case.In March 2019, Kavanagh’s attorneys again requested the trial date be moved because Tara Crane had departed their office and been replaced in November 2018. House granted the delay and moved the trial to January 2020, where it had remained until Lundt’s departure and the ruling this week.Setting the trial to begin on May 4, 2020, gives the public defenders representing Kavanagh about seven months to prepare for the trial.Correction: The Record previously incorrectly reported the number of Kavanagh trial dates that have been postponed. This is the seventh time the trial date has been moved, not the sixth.

Shawn Kavanagh