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WARREN -- One of the defendants facing capital murder charges in the Jan. 19 fatal fire on Nevada Avenue NW had his jury trial scheduled for early 2024 in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court.
Zachary W. Gurd, 23, of Youngstown, appeared in orange jail coveralls Wednesday and stood by his court-appointed attorneys, Kevin M. Cafferkey and Mary Ellen Ditchey, as he waived his right to a speedy trial before Common Pleas Judge Cynthia Rice.
Defendants who are incarcerated in Ohio must be tried within 90 days of their arrest unless they waive that right. On Wednesday, Gurd signed a waiver adding 300 days to the 90-day limit, allowing the trial to be scheduled on Feb. 12, 2024.
Gurd has entered not guilty pleas on two counts of aggravated murder with specifications that each carry death penalty-level sentences; two counts of attempted aggravated murder; two counts of aggravated arson; one count of aggravated burglary; and one count of tampering with evidence.
The charges are connected to an arson on Nevada Avenue NW in Warren that killed 16-year-old Chassidy Broadstone.
Gurd, who is being held pending the posting of a $500,000 bond, faces the same death-penalty-level charges as his codefendants Brendan Daviduk, 28, and Patricia Zarlingo, 27, also from Youngstown. The aggravating circumstances that call for death penalty-level charges involve the trio being accused of the murder while in commission of the felonies of aggravated burglary and aggravated arson.
The defense attorneys had filed a motion on Wednesday seeking to dismiss the capital components of the case, citing constitutional and international law restrictions on death penalty cases. Rice, however, had yet to set a hearing on that matter, giving the prosecution a chance to respond.
Gurd's codefendants also are housed in the Trumbull County jail without bond, awaiting their next pretrial hearings May 31 before Judge Sean O'Brien.
At the hearing Wednesday, the defense attorney said they have motioned for prosecutors for a bill of particulars in the case. All evidence sought for by the defense will be handed over, according to Christopher Becker, assistant Trumbull County prosecutor.
Becker has said the evidence against Gurd is strong, citing a video showing the defendant inside the home with a gasoline can in hand.
If Gurd would make the bond, he must submit to electronically monitored house arrest. At last week's hearing, Gurd told the judge he probably would not be able to make that bond.
Gurd had fled to Virginia after Warren police detectives named him as a suspect in the fatal fire. On Feb. 3, he was caught by U.S. Marshals shortly after leaving a Greyhound bus station in the Richmond, Va., area. He waived his right to an extradition hearing and was transported back to Ohio to face the felony charges. He was booked into the jail March 5.
The three are accused of starting the house fire that killed the Warren G. Harding High School junior and hospitalized her two sisters.