KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Attorneys for Kylr Yust were granted a motion to retest some physical evidence ahead of his double murder trial in Cass County, set to begin in July.
According to documents filed Monday in Cass County Circuit Court, Oklahoma-based DNA Solutions must be allowed to access skeletal remains for both Kara Kopetsky and Jessica Runions, whose remains were found in rural Cass County in 2017.
Documents also say DNA Solutions must be allowed to test hair recovered from a white SUV in 2013.
All testing must be done at the DNA Solutions lab in Oklahoma, according to the documents. The evidence must be returned to the Jackson County Medical Examiner’s Office and Belton Police Department by April 30.
Both the state and defense will be allowed to have representatives present during the transfer, as well as staff for the medical examiner’s office, Belton police and the Kansas City Crime Lab.
Yust, 31, is charged in Cass County with two counts of first-first-degree murder and two counts of abandoning a corpse in connection with the deaths of Kopetsky, 17, and Runions, 21. Kopetsky disappeared in 2007, and Runions went missing nearly 10 years later in 2016. Both women’s remains were found in 2017.
Yust's trial has been scheduled for late July in Cass County, though jurors will come from St. Charles County outside St. Louis.
