POCATELLO — Brad Scott Compher, the man charged with first-degree murder in the 2004 murder of Nori Jones, pleaded not guilty in Sixth District Court on Monday.

    District Judge David C. Nye read Compher his rights and confirmed that the defendant understood the charges against him — first-degree murder with a deadly weapon enhancement that could add 15 years onto any sentence.

    Flanked by his attorneys, Bannock County public defenders Randy Schulthies and Dave Martinez, Compher seemed calm and composed during his brief appearance.

    The public defenders also asked for transcripts from a four-day long preliminary hearing earlier this month.

    Nye set a trial date in the case for April 18, 2016.

    Bannock County Prosecutor Steve Herzog said the trial date is realistic.

    Herzog said there is extensive technical and forensic evidence in the case, as well as numerous expert witnesses for the state and the defense.

    “I think the time frame is completely reasonable,” Herzog said. “There is a lot of evidence in this case.”

    Compher, who legally changed his name in 2008 from Ralph Roy to Brad Scott, was removed from the courtroom directly after entering the plea. He remains incarcerated at the Bannock County Jail, where he is being held without bond.

    The defendant was arrested in September, almost 10 years after Jones was stabbed to death in her Pole Line Road home.

    During the preliminary hearing, DNA experts for the state testified that DNA left at the scene of the slaying linked Compher to the crime.

    Following that hearing, Deputy Prosecutor Zach Parris said the decade-old murder case is still an active investigation.

    Compher became a person of interest in the cold case after investigators got a hit on a fingerprint left at the murder scene.

    The Pocatello Police Department received a $5,000 grant from the Rocky Mountain Information Network. TNT’s “Cold Justice,” a crime series that profiled the case, helped fund DNA analysis of forensic evidence collected in the case.