Man accused of helping plot to kill Longmont postal worker has trial delayed
May 19—The man accused of plotting with a woman to help her kill the father of her child in Longmont had his trial pushed back to December.
Andrew Ritchie, 34, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Jason Schaefer, 33, and was set to stand trial starting Aug. 8.
But the codefendant in the case, Devan Schreiner, recently had her own trial in the case pushed back to Oct. 10, and attorneys agreed it made more sense for Ritchie's trial to take place after Schreiner's.
Defense attorneys filed a motion to continue Ritchie's trial, and prosecutors did not oppose the motion. Boulder District Judge Thomas Mulvahill granted the motion in court Thursday, and set Ritchie for a new trial starting Dec. 5.
Ritchie, who appeared at the hearing in custody, also agreed to extend the deadline on his speedy trial rights to accommodate the trial date. He also has a pre-trial conference set for Nov. 9.
Ritchie and Schreiner were originally set for a joint trial, but Mulvahill ordered that the cases be severed.
Schreiner and Ritchie are accused of plotting to kill Schaefer while he was delivering mail in southwest Longmont on Oct. 13.
According to an affidavit, just after 12:30 p.m. on that date, Schaefer was shot three times next to his postal delivery van, near a cluster of mailboxes on Heatherhill Street just west of Renaissance Drive.
Two employees of the Longmont post office, upon arriving at the scene, asked police if the assailant was Schreiner, noting the two had been in a custody dispute.
Just two days before the shooting, Schaefer had filed a request to modify parenting time, and witnesses also said Schreiner appeared upset that Schaefer had recently started dating Schreiner's 19-year-old sister.
The morning of the shooting, according to the affidavit, detectives said cell phone data shows Schreiner and Ritchie were both at her Fort Collins apartment before they drove to Ritchie's home in Loveland.
At that point it appears Ritchie then took Schreiner to the Loveland post office, and Schreiner began her route as a Loveland postal carrier while Ritchie drove into Longmont and began following Schaefer on his route.
A rideshare vehicle used by the Englewood prison where Ritchie worked as a guard was seen on camera several times following Schaefer's postal van, and Ritchie's cell phone data and GPS data from Schaefer's postal scanner also appeared to be in the same location for most of the morning, the affidavit states.
Surveillance cameras then spotted Schreiner's SUV — identifiable by a missing hubcap on its passenger side — driving into the neighborhood of the shooting, ultimately parking on Renaissance Drive south of the shooting scene.
Security cameras picked up a person walking from the area of the SUV north toward Schaefer. Another security camera picked up the person approaching Schaefer's van, picked up the sound of gunshots, and then showed the person running from the area, according to the affidavit.
Security cameras then captured the person running south before Schreiner's SUV was again seen, this time leaving the area.
The suspect in the videos was originally described as a man in a dark hoodie, wearing a blue mask. But detectives said a photo later recovered from Ritchie's phone depicts Schreiner in a similar outfit.
Ritchie, in an interview with police, said Schreiner the day of the shooting said "she had everything she needed" and that "today was the day."
According to the affidavit, Ritchie then left the Longmont area before the shooting and was seen eating lunch with friends at a Hooters in Loveland.
Meanwhile, at 11 a.m. both Schreiner's own postal scanner and cellphone were tracked to Ritchie's home and remained stationary until about 1 p.m., with no outgoing transmissions from the cell.
