Michigan Judge Sets Schedule for Cadden/Chin

By Walter F. Roche Jr.

A Livingston County judge has set a schedule for a series of pre-trial motions in the trial of two former pharmacists charged with 11 counts of second degree murder.
The seven motions, which include an anticipated request to move the long awaited trial to another county, will be spread out well into 2021 with the final session scheduled for May 13 of next year.
Six of the motions are expected to come from the lawyers for defendants Barry Cadden and Glenn Chin and one from the Michigan Attorney General's office which is prosecuting the case.
The schedule issued by Livingston Circuit Court Judge Michael P. Hatty follows an initial pre-trial conference last month. Hatty also has scheduled three additional status conferences on Dec. 4 of this year and March 19 and June 11 of next year.
The charges against Cadden and Chin come from state and federal investigations of the 2012 fungal meningitis outbreak caused by contaminated drugs shipped from the the New England Compounding Center, where Cadden and Chin worked.
Under Hatty's schedule the motion to change the location of the trial will be heard on Oct. 15. At the same session Hatty also will consider a motion to dismiss some or all of the charges because of double jeopardy. Both Cadden and Chin were charged with second degree murder in federal court and they were cleared of those charges as part of a racketeering charge.
The Michigan case, however, includes six additional second degree murder charges that were not included in the federal charges.
Defense attorneys are expected to argue that their clients cannot get a fair trial in Livingston County because all the victims lived in that county.
Other hearings set by Hatty's order include a motion to overturn District Court Judge Shauna Murphy's July order binding the case against Cadden and Chin over to circuit court for trial. That hearing is set for Nov. 19.
A Dec. 17 hearing is set for a motion to suppress evidence seized by Michigan investigators on a search warrant.
Another motion to exclude expert testimony by prosecution witnesses is set for April 15 of next year while a motion to exclude testimony by another unnamed witness is set for May 13 of next year.
The lone prosecution motion, a motion for joinder of the charges against both defendants, to assure they are tried together, is set for Feb. 18 of next year.
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