May 29, 2003 By Jennifer Harr 3 min read

The attorney for a 20-year-old man accused of killing four people wants his client’s trial moved from Fayette County, claiming intense media attention has made it impossible for him to get a fair trial. Mark Duane Edwards Jr. “has been exposed to an incessant barrage of coverage in all medias,” according to a motion filed by his attorney, First Public Defender Susan Ritz Harper.

State police said Edward confessed to killing Larry Bobish Sr., his wife, Joanna, their daughter, Krystal, and her unborn son.

In addition to four counts of homicide, Edwards, who faces the death penalty, is also charged with attempted homicide for allegedly shooting Larry Bobish Jr., and cutting his neck.

The youngest Bobish, who survived the attack and is the main witness against Edwards, named him as the man who fatally shot his family last April 14. Bobish Jr., known as “LJ,” identified Edwards from a photo line-up presented to him in his hospital bed at Children’s Hospital in Pittsburgh.

Harper is also seeking to have Bobish Jr.’s identification suppressed because police reportedly did not include individuals who looked enough like Edwards. Harper, in her motion, termed the line-up “suggestive.”

Police arrested Edwards in the days following the quadruple homicide, and in court documents released earlier this year, authorities detail an interview with him after the arrest during which Edwards rambles in few-word phrases.

Harper hopes to have those statements given to police thrown out because Edwards asked for a lawyer, but she claimed police continued to talk to him about God and church. She called police methods “mental coercion,” and noted in the motion that Edwards’ constitutional rights were violated when police continued to talk to him.

Edwards reportedly told police that he went to the Bobish’s North Union Township home in the days before the killings and robbed Larry Bobish Sr. of several bottles of “wet,” PCP-laced formaldehyde used to dip cigarettes or marijuana into.

Police allege that Edwards, afraid that Bobish would go to the police and claim he was robbed, went back to the home and killed the family to keep them quiet.

After the shooting, Edwards reportedly set the house on fire to conceal the crime, but Bobish Jr. escaped and was found by an off-duty state police corporal delivering newspapers with his sons.

Edwards is currently undergoing psychological examinations at the request of his attorney to determine if he is mentally able to assist in his defense.

No date has been set for a judge to hear the motions.