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Last updated on Thursday, September 13, 2012
(BROWNSTOWN) - 24-year-old John Shoultz III, of Crothersville, will soon go on trial on a charge of conspiracy to kill Jackson County Chief Deputy Prosecutor Amy Travis.
Shoultz is already serving 58 years in prison after a circuit court jury found him guilty in June of murdering his father in May 2009.
Aubrey Woods of the Seymour Tribune reports that Shoultz's trial, had been scheduled to begin Monday. But Jackson Circuit Judge Bill Vance Tuesday postponed the trial to October 22 in Jackson Circuit Court.
Prosecutor Rick Poynter said Shoultz's attorney, Ethan Bartanen of Salem, had filed a motion to continue the trial for a month.
According to a probable cause affidavit in the case, Shoultz conspired with Michael Luttrull in two separate murder plots between Jan. 1, 2010, and Feb. 18, 2010. At the time, both men were inmates at Jackson County Jail in Brownstown.
However, Shoultz's mother, Rhonda Shoultz, says the trial is an example of the prosecutor's office having a vendetta against her son. She disputes the courtroom version of what happened when her husband was killed.
Court documents pertaining to the conspiracy case state that Shoultz " drew a diagram of phone number of a person to aid Luttrull" in carrying out a murder plot against Travis.
According to Detective Rob Henley with the Jackson County Sheriff's Department, Deputy Prosecutor Jeff Chalfant, received a letter from an informant warning that Shoultz and Luttrull had planned the "assassination" of Travis.
That letter went on to say Shoultz believed he could be acquitted on his murder charge and, once released, he would kill Travis with a high- powered rifle.
Police says Shoultz later changed his mind and wanted Luttrull to make a pipe bomb when released from jail and mail it to Travis at the prosecutor's office. In return, he would give Luttrull a 1946 Ford or a 1949 Ford.
Police say, Shoultz threatened to kill Travis after she offered him a plea agreement to serve 55 years in prison for the murder of his father when he says he shot his father in self-defense.
In the second count against Shoultz, he threatened to murder another person who he says had been "messing with his mom and girlfriend."
Poynter says he plans to handle prosecution of the case because it involves a member of his staff.
On July 16, Shoultz was sentenced to 58 years in prison for the murder of his father, John Shoultz.
According to a probable cause affidavit, the two men got into a fight over Shoultz's mother's dog, which led to the younger Shoultz killing his father John Shoultz II. Police say the fight began when the younger Shoultz taped together the legs of a Chihuahua that his mother had just received from her husband.
Shoultz claims his father became angry and entered his bedroom with a straight razor in one hand and the dog in the other.
He told police that he fired one shot in the ceiling before firing three shots at his father in what he described as self-defense because he believed his dad was going to cut him or his girlfriend, who was also in the room.
An autopsy revealed the elder Shoultz had been shot four times with .40- caliber bullets. He was shot twice in the chest, once in the lower left abdomen and once in the right hand.
Shoultz also received a 15-year sentence after the jury found him guilty of a second count, possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon.
On Aug. 20, Shoultz filed a notice that he plans to appeal his murder conviction.
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