A couple accused of murdering teenage housemate Amber Haigh more than two decades ago will face a judge-alone trial next year.
Robert Samuel Geeves and his wife Anne Margaret Geeves, both 62, pleaded not guilty to murdering the 19-year-old when they faced NSW Supreme Court on Friday via audio-visual link from the Goulburn and Silverwater correctional centres.
Their joint two-month-long trial will take place at the NSW Supreme Court in Wagga Wagga from June 17, 2024.
Ms Haigh was reported missing on June 19, 2002, after failing to return to her home at Kingsvale in southern NSW, where she and her six-month-old son had been living with the couple.
Police were told the pair dropped the young mother at Campbelltown station on June 5 where she intended to travel by train to Mt Druitt in western Sydney to visit her sick father in hospital.
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Later that night, money was withdrawn from her bank account at a Campbelltown ATM.
Her body has never been found.
A 2011 inquest found Ms Haigh died as a result of homicide or other misadventure in June 2002.
The case remained largely untouched for another decade until 2020, when Strike Force Villamar II launched a new investigation.
NSW Police increased the reward for information from $100,000 to $1 million in April.
The pair were arrested and charged at a property in the Riverina town of Harden in May.
Australian Associated Press
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