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GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.—A judge says a trial can proceed against a man suspected in a 1994 rape and murder in Mesa County, after DNA evidence freed another man who spent years in prison for the crimes.
In a preliminary hearing Thursday, a judge ruled the case against Douglas Thames can proceed.
Thames faces charges including first-degree murder in the slaying of Jacie Taylor, who lived near him in Palisade. His trial is set for February.
In 1996, jurors convicted Robert Dewey in Taylor’s death. The verdict was reversed last year after DNA in the case was retested. Investigators say the new tests helped free Dewey and implicated Thames, who already is serving a life sentence for the 1989 rape and murder of a Fort Collins woman.
