Famalaro Enters Not Guilty Plea : Courts: Oct. 17 hearing is set for man charged with murder and kidnaping of Huber. Grand jury indictment is possible; prosecutors still may seek the death penalty.

A handyman accused of killing a young Newport Beach woman and keeping her nude body in a freezer for three years pleaded not guilty Monday to the charges against him, including allegations that make him eligible for the death penalty.

John J. Famalaro stood behind a glass courtroom partition during the brief hearing in Municipal Court in Newport Beach as his lawyer entered a plea of not guilty to charges of murder and kidnaping.

Municipal Judge Craig Edward Robison set a preliminary hearing for Oct. 17 to determine if there is sufficient evidence to order that the 37-year-old former Lake Forest man be bound over for trial in Superior Court. He is charged in the murder of Denise Huber, whose baffling disappearance in 1991 sparked a massive search that made her name a household word in Orange County.

The district attorney’s office, however, could circumvent the public hearing process by obtaining a grand jury indictment, which precludes the need for a preliminary hearing.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Christopher J. Evans would not comment on the possibility that a grand jury indictment would be sought in the case. Deputy Public Defender Brian Ducker, one of two defenders representing Famalaro, said he has been notified that the district attorney might use the grand jury, but did not know for sure if that would happen.

Famalaro, one of the county’s most notorious murder suspects, has been held without bail in protective custody in Orange County Jail since his extradition earlier this month from Arizona. Huber’s body was discovered in a freezer that Famalaro kept running in a rental truck parked in the driveway of his Prescott Country Club home in that state. An electrical cord extended from the freezer to Famalaro’s house.

Ducker said outside the courtroom Monday that he is satisfied with measures taken by the Sheriff’s Department jail staff to protect Famalaro, who has been the subject of verbal death threats by other inmates. Famalaro is being held in a single-person cell and is escorted by an Orange County sheriff’s deputy whenever he leaves it, officials have said.

Huber, then 23, was a UCI graduate working as a waitress and department store clerk when she vanished June 3, 1991, after attending a rock concert in Inglewood. Her car was found with a flat tire on the shoulder of the Corona del Mar Freeway in Costa Mesa, less than two miles from her parents’ Newport Beach home, where she was living.

Her disappearance remained a mystery until July 13 of this year when Arizona authorities, tipped that the rental truck had been reported stolen when Famalaro failed to return it on time, made the gruesome discovery.

Arizona deputies forced open the truck, believing that Famalaro had concealed drugs or drug-processing equipment in it. Instead, they found the freezer containing Huber’s body.

Famalaro already pleaded not guilty to the killing in Arizona, where he was originally charged with murder before jurisdiction in the case was transferred to California. Orange County authorities sought to have his case transferred here after they discovered traces of Huber’s blood in a Laguna Hills storage facility, where Famalaro was living at the time of her disappearance.

Authorities believe Famalaro lured Huber into his car, possibly under the guise of helping a stranded motorist, and then later bludgeoned her to death in the storage facility.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Evans declined to comment Monday on whether the autopsy or other tests indicated that Huber had been sexually assaulted.

Ducker also declined to talk further about the case and his client, saying he and co-counsel Leonard Gumlia are still reviewing some 4,000 pages of police reports and other documents. He said he’s expecting another 5,000 to 6,000 pages of documents.

Famalaro could face the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole if convicted of the charges against him. But a committee of Orange County prosecutors who decide which cases warrant death penalty treatment have yet to make a decision in Famalaro’s case.