Lyons To Go On Trial

After a preliminary hearing last week, Judge Brian Hill ruled on Monday afternoon that sufficient evidence exists to bring Corey Lyons-charged with the May 4 murder of his brother, Daniel Lyons, 55, and Barbara Scharton, 48-before a jury later this month. Corey Lyons, who had been contracted by his brother to build a home on the Mesa, was in the midst of a legal dispute concerning contract obligations, and on the date that papers finalizing the settlement between the two brothers were to be signed, Daniel Lyons and Scharton were shot to death in separate bedrooms of their home.

Preliminary hearing testimony included several officers who said that they went to Corey Lyons’ Goleta home in the hours just before dawn, but that he could not be found. His truck was in the driveway, but his wife did not know where he was. A later investigation revealed blood beneath the seat of his RV, a bloody towel in the laundry room, and several small blood stains on the driveway of Lyons’s home. Officer Eric Beecher explained in his testimony that he, along with several other officers, were the first to contact Lyons as he walked up to his house at about9:15 a.m. that morning. “He didn’t say anything when we put handcuffs on him. He was shaking almost uncontrollably,” he said.