The Telfair County man accused in the 2015 double murder of an elderly couple wants his indictment thrown out.
Jay Towns appeared in Telfair County Superior Court Monday for a motions hearing.
There are at least 96 motions filed in the case -- but prosecutors and defense lawyers spent nearly the entire day debating one of them.
The hearing began with Towns’ lawyers are asking Telfair Superior Court Judge, Sarah Wall, to throw out their client’s indictment.
They argued that the composition of the March 2015 grand jury was unconstitutional, because it was not picked randomly.
Superior Court Clerk, Belinda Thomas took the witness stand and testified that a computer randomly generates a list of potential jurors.
But not enough people showed up for the grand jury to hear the Towns case.
Thomas says Judge Walls instructed her to select people who were on the list for the next day’s trial jury, and Thomas admits she called four people on that list that she knew lived or worked close to the courthouse.
She said, "I just called people that I thought we could get here in a hurry... it was not that I specifically selected them for a reason.”
But the defense argues that violates the rules for picking juries -- even bringing an ‘expert witness’ statistician who says that does not qualify as random selection.
Judge Wall did not rule on the matter Monday, and the motions hearing is scheduled to resume Tuesday morning.
Towns is accused of committing the 2015 double murder of Bud and June Runion—an elderly couple who traveled from Marietta to Telfair County to look at a car Towns listed on Craigslist.
Investigators say he robbed the pair before shooting and killing them.
Their bodies were found in the woods just days after they went missing.
Monday morning, Towns entered the courtroom wearing dress clothes and a smile as he took his seat next to his lawyers.
A row of Town's family members watched the hearing, but they declined comment.
Apparently, no one was present on behalf of the Runions.
Towns is charged with four counts of felony murder, two counts of malice murder and two counts of armed robbery.
District Attorney Tim Vaughn is seeking the death penalty against Towns.
No trial date has been set.