Carpenter pleads not guilty

Trial in Ramey murder tentatively set for June

By Lyndsie Kiebert
Reader Staff

Judith Carpenter, the Coeur d’Alene woman accused of shooting and killing 79-year-old Hope resident Shirley Ramey in 2017, pleaded not guilty Jan. 13 to a charge of first-degree murder.

Judith Carpenter.

Bonner County District Court Judge Barbara Buchanan requested Carpenter’s plea during the Jan. 13 arraignment and went on to ask legal counsel on both sides for a tentative trial date. Representing Carpenter, attorney Joseph Sullivan said a June date would be best, seeing as they are still waiting for some key DNA evidence to come back from the state forensics lab in Boise.

“We’re in limbo regarding what kinds of experts we’d need to bring on board,” Sullivan said at the hearing.

Bonner County Prosecutor Louis Marshall agreed to the June date, requesting at least eight days to complete the trial. Buchanan then set Tuesday, June 9 as the date to begin Carpenter’s trial.

A pre-trial hearing is set for May 22 at 9 a.m. at the Bonner County Courthouse.

Case information was filed in October 2019 — more than six months prior to the June trial date, — meaning the defendant must waive her right to a “speedy trial,” Buchanan said. Carpenter agreed during the Jan. 13 hearing to waive that right.

While we have you ...

... if you appreciate that access to the news, opinion, humor, entertainment and cultural reporting in the Sandpoint Reader is freely available in our print newspaper as well as here on our website, we have a favor to ask. The Reader is locally owned and free of the large corporate, big-money influence that affects so much of the media today. We're supported entirely by our valued advertisers and readers. We're committed to continued free access to our paper and our website here with NO PAYWALL - period. But of course, it does cost money to produce the Reader. If you're a reader who appreciates the value of an independent, local news source, we hope you'll consider a voluntary contribution. You can help support the Reader for as little as $1.

You can contribute at either Paypal or Patreon.

Contribute at Patreon Contribute at Paypal

You may also like...

Close [x]

Want to support independent local journalism?

The Sandpoint Reader is our town's local, independent weekly newspaper. "Independent" means that the Reader is locally owned, in a partnership between Publisher Ben Olson and Keokee Co. Publishing, the media company owned by Chris Bessler that also publishes Sandpoint Magazine and Sandpoint Online. Sandpoint Reader LLC is a completely independent business unit; no big newspaper group or corporate conglomerate or billionaire owner dictates our editorial policy. And we want the news, opinion and lifestyle stories we report to be freely available to all interested readers - so unlike many other newspapers and media websites, we have NO PAYWALL on our website. The Reader relies wholly on the support of our valued advertisers, as well as readers who voluntarily contribute. Want to ensure that local, independent journalism survives in our town? You can help support the Reader for as little as $1.