Utah man accused of killing Sierra Newbold appears in court after nearly two years

West Jordan • It has been nearly two years since Terry Lee Black stood before a district court judge for a hearing in his criminal case, in which he is accused of kidnapping, raping and killing a 6-year-old West Jordan girl.

The 44-year-old man looked different on Tuesday. His black hair is long and tied in a ponytail, and the once-stocky man is now significantly thinner.

But the question before a 3rd District Court judge is still the same: Is Black competent to stand trial on aggravated murder, child kidnapping and rape of a child charges in the 2012 death of Sierra Newbold?

Black's attorney, McCaye Christianson, told Judge Douglas Hogan that psychologists have finished evaluating Black and have written their reports — though no one has received the expert's reports because Black's case was put on hold so attorneys could before the Utah Supreme Court over issues concerning a different judge who was initially assigned to the case.

Hogan said he would receive the competency reports this week, and would then distribute them to attorneys. He set an Oct. 22 date to discuss the evaluations, and possibly set future court dates if Black is ruled competent to proceed.

Prosecutor Robert Stott said after Tuesday's hearing that Sierra's family is "just amazed" that the court process has taken this long.

"From the very first day, we've tried to make this thing move along as fast as possible," Stott said. "There are a lot of people who are very concerned. A lot of people who find these slow proceedings to be not only tedious, but extremely frustrating."

But Christianson said the defense team has only done what they needed to do in the case.

"I think it's in everyone's interest to have it done correctly," she said. "We filed motions that we had to file. Possibly the process could have been shortened if the state had chosen to not oppose some of the things we were looking for."

According to charging documents, Black allegedly abducted Sierra on June 26, 2012, from her West Jordan house — about a block from his own home — and beat, raped and strangled her before throwing her into a nearby canal, where she drowned.

Three days later, Black was arrested on suspicion of an unrelated bank robbery.

When he was taken into custody, investigators noticed soot and debris on his clothing and hands that was similar to the materials in a field where Sierra's clothes were found.

Lab results later showed that Black's DNA matched DNA found on Sierra's body, prosecutors said.

Black has sent letters to The Salt Lake Tribune from jail in which he has maintained his innocence. He said police were looking for someone to pin Sierra Newbold's murder on, and he was an easy target who got caught up in the investigation.

The case went before the Utah Supreme Court on an interlocutory appeal in December 2013 after Black's attorneys claimed 3rd District Judge Mark Kouris was biased against him.

They further argued that Kouris could not serve as both a magistrate in ruling whether there was probable cause for the case to move forward and as a judge in other court proceedings, including a competency review.

But the high court ruled that Kouris could "switch between a magistrate role and judicial role in the same case."

The justices did not rule on whether Kouris' statements during a July 2013 hearing were biased, saying the issue was moot because the judge has moved to a different courthouse and is no longer presiding over Black's case.

The accusations of bias followed a July 18, 2013, hearing, at which defense attorneys asked that Black's preliminary hearing be delayed because of possible competency issues.

At that hearing, Kouris questioned why the defense attorneys waited until a week before the five-day preliminary hearing was set to begin to ask for a competency review, since the lawyers at that time had been dealing with the case for about a year.

"I have to tell you, the timing to me is very, very suspicious," the judge said. "You claim it's in good faith; I have no reason to doubt you, except that the timing is a little problematic for me."

In a subsequent court filing, Black's attorneys described Kouris' words during the hearing as "hostile, demeaning and humiliating and disparaged the integrity and ethics of counsel for the defendant."

jmiller@sltrib.com

Twitter: @jm_miller