Second bow-and-arrow trial postponed

The suspect in the 2015 bow-and-arrow killing will not stand trial next week as initially scheduled.

A hearing has been set for 9 a.m. Friday, Oct. 1, in Chief Judge H. Chris Ryan’s courtroom as the defendant’s new attorney Maureen Williams, of Peoria, needs time to get acclimated with the case.

French, 27, formerly of Varna, is set soon for a second murder trial.

French would face 20-60 years in prison if again convicted of first-degree murder. He admitted to shooting Joshua Scaman of Ottawa with a razor-tipped hunting arrow, causing Scaman to bleed to death, in a remote parking lot in 2015.

French tried to argue he fired in self-defense, and an appeals court reversed his conviction and sent it back after ruling that he was not properly afforded a chance to argue self-defense.