"We had prepared ourselves mentally to go through this," said Richard Davis, father of Kiplyn Davis, then 15.

However, he said, it was better that the technical error that forced the delay of Timmy Brent Olsen's perjury trial was discovered before the scheduled start Monday, rather than after the proceeding began.

July appears to be the earliest time that U.S. District Judge Thomas Greene and defense and prosecuting attorneys will all be free to proceed with the case. The trial is expected to last up to three weeks.

Kiplyn, a sophomore at Spanish Fork High School, disappeared in 1995 and is presumed dead. Then-U.S. Attorney Paul Warner revived the investigation in 2003 and convened a federal grand jury. Olsen, a 28-year-old Spanish Fork mechanic, is accused of lying to that grand jury. Last year, the panel indicted him and four other men, most of them former classmates of Kiplyn, on perjury charges.

But on Sunday, the U.S. Attorney's Office realized that the term of the grand jury had mistakenly been extended twice, when only one extension is allowed. Prosecutors plan to present the case Wednesday to the current federal grand jury to obtain a new indictment.

Olsen is accused of 16 counts of perjury. Each count carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison.

New indictments also will be sought against former classmates David Rucker Leifson, 29, and Christopher Neal Jeppson, 29, who both are free pending their perjury trials. The remaining two men have pleaded guilty.

In January, the Utah County Attorney's Office filed a state count of murder, a first-degree felony, against Olsen in Kiplyn's death. A trial on that charge will be held after the perjury prosecution is completed. If convicted, Olsen could get a life sentence.

pmanson@sltrib.com