Double Trouble: Spector's Retrial To Commence

Phil Spector buttons his blazer outside the courthouse during his first murder trial. The jury deadlocked at the end of that trial.

LOS ANGELES, California---The retrial of famed music producer extraordinaire, Harvey Phillip Spector has been set to begin some time in October. Spector, 67, is accused of fatally shooting actress, Lana Clarkson at his Pyrenees Castle home in Alhambra, California some time during the morning hours of February 3, 2003. He has pled NOT GUILTY to the charge and has maintained that the depressed, B-movie actress committed suicide.

Judge Larry Paul Fidler declared a mistrial in Spector's first trial on September 26, 2007 after each of the twelve jurors had told him that there was no way a unanimous verdict could be reached. The jury had voted, 10-2 to convict the embattled producer.

Spector's defense team has tried numerous tricks to delay the retrial including accusing the presiding judge of being biased against Spector. The defense team had asked Judge Fidler to recuse himself and had sought to have a neutral judge appointed to investigate the matter. Judge Fidler refused the recusation request and an appeals court denied the request by the Defense.

A California Appeals Court panel has also denied Spector's most recent argument, a Motion for Stay, wherein he claimed double jeopardy. Spector's lawyers were attempting to keep the Prosecution from seeking lesser charges against their client because the original judge had declared that these charges were unacceptable, thus, in their minds, automatically acquitting Spector. Prosecutors have not determined yet whether they will seek to have these charges introduced to the jury at the retrial.

Spector has also refiled a suit against his former attorney, Robert Shapiro for $1,000,000. Spector claims that Shapiro has refused to return his retainer after being fired. Shapiro is best known for successfully defending O.J. Simpson on double murder charges in 1995.

Should Spector be convicted this time around, he is looking at life in prison.