A trial date has lastly been set for Ibraheem Yazeed — the person charged with the kidnapping and homicide of 19-year-old Aniah Blanchard, who’s the stepdaughter of ex-UFC heavyweight fighter Walt Harris.
Yazeed was arrested and charged with the crime all the way in which again in 2019 however delays and continuances have persistently pushed again the trial date. Now a choose has set a trial date for March 2, 2026 with jury choice starting on the case unfolding in a Tuskeegee, Ala. courtroom.
Yazeed faces three counts of capital homicide, and he faces the loss of life penalty if discovered responsible. Information of the trial date was first reported by WVTM 13.
He’s charged with Blanchard’s disappearance and homicide in 2019 after her physique was discovered weeks after she first went lacking.
Blanchard’s physique was recovered by authorities in a wooded space in Macon County, Ala., with the stays later recognized because the lacking Southern Union Group School pupil. She first went lacking in October 2019.
An post-mortem was carried out with authorities confirming Blanchard was killed by a gunshot wound and Yazeed is barely particular person being charged along with her homicide after he initially confronted first-degree kidnapping costs.
Blanchard was reported lacking on Oct. 24, 2019 and she or he was later noticed on surveillance footage at a neighborhood comfort retailer in Auburn, Ala. Yazeed was seen on the identical surveillance footage within the retailer concurrently Blanchard and an eyewitness later recognized him as the person he noticed drive Blanchard into her automobile in opposition to her will.
Blanchard’s 2017 Honda CR-V was recovered two days later with a “life-threatening” quantity of blood found inside. Police then introduced that they believed she was the sufferer of foul play.
Yazeed’s arrest quickly adopted however Blanchard’s physique wasn’t recovered till November the place she was declared useless and the kidnapping case then become a murder investigation.
Harris and his spouse have been clearly devastated by the lack of their daughter, however he finally returned to his preventing profession competing three extra occasions for the UFC earlier than receiving his launch.
On the time of his arrest, Yazeed was out on bond on costs of kidnapping, tried homicide and theft in an unrelated case. Blanchard’s homicide led to Alabama adopting “Aniah’s Legislation,” which provides judges extra energy to have defendants held with out bond in circumstances involving violent crimes.
Yazeed plead not responsible to the crime and his attorneys argued for added delays in beginning the trial with hopes to push again the date till later in 2026. The courts disagreed beneath the not too long ago enacted Speedy Trials Act, which seeks to handle the super backlog of felony circumstances in Alabama.
Now Yazeed is ready to face trial beginning in March.
