Man stays in custody awaiting appeal involving murder charge

A Medicine Hat man will remain in custody as he appeals manoeuvring between two levels of court to bring him to trial on murder charges.

Chase Leland Hehr was denied bail Thursday in a decision by Court of Queens Bench Justice Robert Hall that was read out in virtual proceedings from the Medicine Hat courthouse.

Hehr sought release while he is appealing a move by Court of Queens Bench to send him to trial on second-degree murder charges after a Provincial Court judge dismissed the case last January following a preliminary hearing.

That QB decision also ordered he be arrested in October 2020, and Hehr’s appeal of that matter is scheduled to be heard in April 2021.

Hehr, 37, was arrested and held in custody in January 2019 and charged with second-degree murder after RCMP officers found the body of his wife, June Rose, in the trailer home they shared at Bassano.

Details of the case remain subject to a publication ban.