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Bob Leonard wants trial delayed due to hernia

Posted at 6:21 PM, Jan 04, 2016
and last updated 2016-01-04 23:15:46-05

INDIANAPOLIS -- Bob Leonard says he wants his trial, which is scheduled to start in Fort Wayne on January 19, delayed because of a painful hernia.

Leonard spoke to Call 6 Investigates Rafael Sanchez via telephone from the Marion County Jail on Monday.

He says he can't sit up because of the "severe pain" caused by a "hernia which is the size of a basketball" which he's had since 2010.

Leonard says he will ask for a delay until he can get a hernia operation. 

He has been in the Marion County Jail since 2012.

Leonard's trial was moved to Allen County because of pre-trial publicity.

He says he didn't want the trial moved because he trusts the people in Marion County.

"Either you did or didn't do it. I had nothing to do with it, " said Leonard of the November 2012 explosion in Richmond Hill that killed two people.

PREVIOUS | Richmond Hill explosion 

The Marion County Prosecutor's Office may present several pieces of evidence at trial to challenge Leonard's statements.

The jury could see evidence that Leonard's DNA was found on the front door of the house that exploded.

The prosecutor may also call a witness who was asked by the Leonard brothers what it would take to ignite natural gas. 

Court documents say there is surveillance video that shows the Leonard brothers together on both Thursday and Friday before the explosion.

Leonard challenges eyewitness testimony that he was one of two men seen in a white van in the Richmond Hill neighborhood hours before the blast.

He says cell phone records will prove he was home at the time.

Leonard says he and his half-brother, Mark, were not close.

Mark is serving life in prison without parole for being the mastermind of the Richmond Hill explosion.

Bob Leonard says it was "a really bad idea" to reconnect with Mark to work on a construction job.

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