Feb. 22—The defendant in a Fourmile Canyon murder case is set for trial in December.

Stephen Christopher Wolf, 29, is charged with first-degree murder after deliberation, felony murder, first-degree burglary, second-degree burglary, tampering with a deceased human body, vehicular eluding and tampering with physical evidence in the death of Jeffrey Michael Lynch, 57.

Following a lengthy delay in the case after Wolf was declared incompetent to stand trial, Boulder District Judge Patrick Butler earlier this month ruled Wolf was competent and the case could proceed.

After losing her previous co-counsel in the case, defense attorney Mary Claire Mulligan said during a hearing Wednesday that she had found an attorney to help with the case.

But Mulligan said the new attorney's schedule was busy until the end of the year and asked for a December trial date.

Prosecutors did not object, and Butler set Wolf for a 10-day trial starting Dec. 11.

Wolf, who appeared virtually from the Boulder County Jail, agreed to extend the deadline on his speedy trial rights to accommodate the trial date.

He remains in custody without bond.

According to an arrest affidavit, Lynch was reported missing July 30, 2019, after he failed to show up at his girlfriend's house on the previous Sunday.

Lynch was a general contractor and had been working on a vacant house on Camino Bosque in Fourmile Canyon, so the property owners went to see if Lynch was there. The owners arrived and found Wolf, who they did not know, sitting in Lynch's car in the garage.

The property owner confronted Wolf, who said he was there to clean before saying the police were after him. The homeowner said she had not hired anyone to work on the house other than Lynch, and she called the Boulder County Sheriff's Office.

When deputies arrived, they found Wolf carrying shovels in a trash bag, according to the affidavit. Wolf saw the deputies and ran into the garage, but the two deputies handcuffed him.

Deputies searched Lynch's car and found his body wrapped in plastic in the trunk of the vehicle.

The coroner's office ruled the cause of Lynch's death was "homicidal violence by unspecified means." While the report could not specify any exact injuries Lynch sustained, due in part to decomposition of the body, a forensic pathologist ruled the manner of death a homicide.

Prosecutors said Wolf, who had been trying to elude police following a traffic stop two days before being found with the body, broke into the home in the hopes of finding fuel for his car, and killed Lynch upon finding him in the house.

Wolf also has been charged with attempted first-degree murder and second-degree assault after reportedly assaulting an inmate at the jail.