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Kehoe Trial Postponed

The federal racketeering trial of white supremacist and antigovernment icon Chevie Kehoe was postponed due to objections by the defense.

The federal racketeering trial of white supremacist Chevie Kehoe, accused of multiple murders and a Washington state bombing, has been postponed to March 1 as defense lawyers in the case raise a series of objections.

Prosecutors say Kehoe and accomplice Danny Lee conspired to carve out of the United States the whites-only "Aryan People's Republic" and were involved in a total of five murders, including the suffocation and torture of an 8-year-old girl.

If convicted in the case, which was originally set for a trial in a Little Rock, Ark., federal courtroom on Feb. 16, Kehoe and Lee face a possible death sentence. Kehoe's father, Kirby Keith Kehoe, is not accused of the murders but faces the same racketeering and conspiracy charges as his son and Lee.

Kirby Kehoe's attorney asked that the case against his client be dismissed, or at least severed from that of his son and Lee, because one of Lee's attorney's had recently been hired by the U.S. attorney's office. The lawyer complained that Karen Coleman had been in on joint defense strategy meetings and her new job with the office that is prosecuting the Kehoes and Lee presents a serious conflict of interest.

Chevie Kehoe's attorney, for his part, has complained that jurors are to be selected from a pool of registered voters. Because his client finds voting "politically and religiously repugnant," attorney Mark Hampton said the pool should include people who share that belief.

Hampton also wants courtroom furniture rearranged so that he can see testifying witnesses at the same time that he watches jurors' demeanor.