On 11 August 2011, Brett Peter Cowan was charged with the abduction and murder of thirteen year old Daniel Morcombe who disappeared from a ‘hail and ride’ bus stop under the Kiel Mountain overpass on the Sunshine Coast on Sunday 7 December 2003. In February 2013, after a committal hearing that ran for three weeks he was committed for trial by Magistrate Brendan Butler. The magistrate said “I am of the opinion the evidence is sufficient to put the defendant on trial.” Mr Cowan is facing five charges, including child stealing, interfering with a corpse, deprivation of liberty, indecent treatment of a child, and murder.
Magistrate Butler said “I am not assessing the guilt of the accused, merely whether there is enough evidence to consider him for trial.”
A pre-trial review has been set down for 6 November 2013. The trial itself will take place in 2014.
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