By DEBRA HAIGHT

Special to Leader Publications

ST. JOSEPH – James Parker Huffman will go to trial in late January for the July murder of his longtime girlfriend, Angela Cluver.

That action came last week, when a preliminary hearing resumed in Berrien County Trial Court after a three-week delay.

The hearing had been delayed when Huffman’s attorney, Scott Sanford, asked to have an assisted suicide violation count added. Huffman’s trial is now set for Jan. 24 to Jan.

26 in Berrien County Trial Court. He will next be in court Dec. 6 for a case conference and Jan. 17 for a status conference before the trial.

Sanford had asked Berrien County Trial Judge Scott Schofield late last month to add a count of violation of the Michigan assisted suicide law, but withdrew his motion Thursday. Assistant Prosecutor Cortney O’Malley said Sanford found after more research that only the prosecutor’s office has charging authority.

Huffman, 52, of South 14th Street in Niles, is charged with one count of first-degree murder in connection with Cluver’s July strangulation death.

Sanford raised the possibility of mounting an assisted suicide defense at the end of an Oct. 24 preliminary hearing. Sanford claimed that Huffman is guilty of violating the Michigan assisted suicide law and not murder.

Sanford said Cluver had no defensive wounds on her body and there was no evidence of a violent struggle. He said if Huffman’s guilty of anything, it would be of assisting Cluver to commit suicide.

That violation is a five-year felony rather than life in prison without parole, which is the penalty for first-degree murder.

Thursday, Schofield ruled there was enough evidence to bind Huffman over for trial. A preliminary hearing which took place in late October featured testimony about Huffman’s statements to police, Cluver’s autopsy and what police found when they searched the South 14th Street home.

Huffman walked into the Niles Law Enforcement Complex July 24 and told police that he had strangled his girlfriend, July 21 in a failed double suicide pact. Police then went to the home and discovered Cluver’s body, which was in a state of decomposition.

Niles police said Huffman told them he attempted to kill himself several times over the weekend by cutting himself, suffocating himself by stuffing socks in his mouth and trying to electrocute himself. An examination of Huffman’s body on July 24 found no evidence of cuts, burn marks or any other injury.