Attorneys for Woodrow Karey Jr., who is charged with the 2013 shooting death of pastor Ronald Harris, filed a motion Friday seeking his release from jail nearly four years after he was incarcerated.

Karey, 57, is accused of walking into Tabernacle of Praise and shooting Harris, 51, twice with a shotgun. He was arrested that day and has been in the Calcasieu Correctional Center since. Karey’s bond is set at $500,000.

In their motion, the defense says that after the state Supreme Court in June upheld a district court ruling to throw out a 2014 second-degree murder indictment against Karey, prosecutors passed on an Aug. 14 trial date due to needing “more time,” despite making previous statements that they were “ready to go.”

The defense argues that the court has no choice but to “acknowledge the defendant’s right to a speedy trial and to release him from incarceration.” The attorneys initially filed a motion for speedy trial in June 2014.

Defense attorneys Adam Johnson and Todd S. Clemons in their motion say that under state law “when the defendant establishes that more than 120 days have passed since the filing of his motion for speedy trial, the burden then shifts to the (prosecution) to show just cause for the delay. There is none for this case.”

The Calcasieu Parish District Attorney’s Office is awaiting the state Supreme Court’s response to a request for a rehearing on its June decision — which, unless reversed, would leave prosecutors seeking a manslaughter charge against Karey instead of second-degree murder.   

A hearing on the defense’s motion for judicial release will be Aug. 24.