--Change of venue request denied --

Iroquois County Judge Gordon Lustfeldt (Monday) denied a change of venue request for Andrew Condon's murder trial. The rural Ashkum man's trial will remain in Iroquois County.

Defense attorney Ed Glazar had asked the court to move the trial for his 34-year-old client, claiming Condon cannot receive a fair trial in Iroquois County due to pretrial publicity. Glazar claimed that more than two-dozen newspaper articles that have been published about the case since Nov. 14, 2012, have prejudiced potential Iroquois County jurors.

Condon has pleaded innocent to two counts of first-degree murder in connection with the October 2012 fatal shooting of 27-year-old Jonathan Rubin of Danforth. Records show Rubin was killed at the Shell gas station in Gilman where worked.

Judge Lustfeldt denied Glazar's motion. Assistant State's Attorney Alex O'Brien argued that the defense failed to meet its burden of proof.

O'Brien said the defense had to show that there's nobody in Iroquois County who either doesn't know about the case or who hasn't already made up their mind on it," and they didn't do that."

94.1 WGFA