Kylr Yust’s attorneys seek independent testing of human remains in two murder cases
Attorneys for a man accused in the deaths of two women are asking to independently review human remains recovered as evidence before he goes to trial.
In a motion filed Tuesday, attorneys for 31-year-old Kylr Yust asked a Cass County judge to order prosecutors to mail to an expert hired by the defense the remains of Kara Kopetsky and Jessica Runions, as well as hair recovered from an SUV searched by the FBI in 2013.
The women’s remains were found in April 2017 after a mushroom hunter found bones in a wooded area south of Belton. The discovery prompted a search that led to the finding of additional remains in the same area.
The bodies were eventually identified as Kopetsky, who had been missing since 2007, and Runions, who had disappeared in 2016.
Six months after the remains were recovered, Yust was charged with two counts of first-degree murder and two counts of abandonment of a corpse.
In charging documents, prosecutors said that Yust had long been suspected in Kopetsky’s death. He had allegedly confessed to at least four people that he choked Kopetsky until she stopped breathing.
The independent examination of the women’s remains will be paid for by Yust and his attorneys if it is approved by the court.
Yust is scheduled to appear in court Thursday morning at 9 a.m.
