The trial of Billy Hawk for a cold case murder has been set for next April 5.
Hawk did not appear in the courtroom on Tuesday morning when District Attorney Neal Pinkston and attorney Jimmy Logan worked out the date with Judge Don Poole.
Hawk is charged with the 1981 murder of Johhny Mack Salyer.
The case was resurrected by a Cold Case team in the District Attorney's Office.
On Wednesday, June 3, 1981, a locked steel drum containing the victim's body was pulled from the Tennessee River near Lakesite.
At the time, Salyer and Hawk were co-defendants in a pending cocaine distribution case.
Billy Hawk’s younger brother, Bobby, and his wife, Bay, were in the news in earlier years when they left town in a dispute over visitation of their children by the Hawk grandparents. After the death of the elder Hawk, Bobby and Bay returned and reconciled with the Hawk grandmother.
The Hawks long operated Holiday Bowl in Brainerd.