Matthew Jaeger sentencing delayed again to consider motion on dismissed juror

The sentencing scheduled later this month for a former Kansas University student convicted in the 2007 beating and kidnapping of his ex-girlfriend will be delayed again as Matthew Jaeger’s attorneys argue that he should get a new trial.

Instead of the Jan. 25 sentencing, Douglas County Chief District Judge Robert Fairchild has scheduled a hearing then to allow attorneys to argue whether the defense is entitled to summon a member of the jury to court for an evidentiary hearing.

Jaeger’s attorneys, Pedro Irigonegaray and Michael Saken, in October filed a motion that said because Shaun Edmondson, a juror who believed their client was innocent, was dismissed, he didn’t have the chance to sway other jurors to his way of thinking or hold onto his beliefs to create a hung jury.

Fairchild dismissed Edmondson during jury deliberations because he re-enacted the victim in the case falling onto a bed rail. The defense had argued that such a fall is how the victim got her injuries.

After Edmondson was replaced with an alternate, jurors convicted Jaeger, 24, of suburban Chicago, of kidnapping, aggravated battery and making a criminal threat. Prosecutors said he broke into the Lawrence apartment of his ex-girlfriend, Francie Biggs, on Oct. 9, 2007, and choked her unconscious, then injured her vaginal area.

Defense attorneys want Fairchild to order an evidentiary hearing so they can subpoena Edmondson to testify.