JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Issues with evidence is once again at the forefront of a high-profile murder case in Jacksonville.

The defense teams for Shanna Gardner and Mario Fernandez say they are missing files and are uncertain the files they have been given are complete from the prosecution. Gardner and Fernandez are facing first-degree-murder charges in the killing of Jared Bridegan. The St. Augustine father of four was murdered in February 2022 in what police have called a “murder-for-hire plot” orchestrated by his ex-wife, Gardner, and her second husband, Fernandez. Both have pleaded not guilty.

On Friday, a two-hour-long case management hearing focused on how the evidence is being shared from the prosecution to the defense teams, and if they have everything they need to proceed to a trial later this year.

The prosecution said they are sharing the evidence, but explained that it is so voluminous in this case that it’s been a challenge in and of itself. So far, they have tried multiple hard drives and two cloud-based websites, but issues have arose with each.

“It takes us days to download and unzip the files, and often times, we open them and it appears to be computer coding,” said Shannon Day, an attorney for Fernandez.

Currently, the prosecution is using a cloud-based site, evidence.com, to share its discovery with the defense teams, but the defense teams said they were running into problems.

Gardner’s attorney, Patrick Korody, and Day said when they open the site, the files are labeled in a series of numbers with no way to know what it is. Also, they said the same piece of evidence has come in, in different file sizes which makes it unclear which version is correct. Day also said there are files that appear to be missing from the discovery.

The prosecution said they are working on creating an index to help make the discovery evidence more searchable and uniform for both sides, but the defense and Judge London Kite raised concerns about how that would work since the file names do not appear to be same across the parties.

“The mechanism that you [the prosecution] all have been using has somehow undone, or whatever you all are looking at, just comes in as a bunch of numbers and so, there is no way this index to truly cross reference for them to make it easier for them,” said Kite, addressing the prosecution.

Kite went back and forth through several options with the attorneys, reminding them that with this being a death penalty case, there cannot be discrepancies in evidence or missing evidence.

“That is the evidence the Jacksonville Beach Police [Department] has in their possession, that I have in my possession, they [the defense] have access to download it,” said Christina Stifler with the prosecution. “We ensure that we are all looking at the same evidence.”

“But, you’re not,” Kite said in response. “You’re not, and that is what is creating the problem. It might be usable for you and law enforcement, it is not usable for the defense. They have been saying now for 13 months they are getting this and that is not usable.”

Kite added they are too far in proceedings to start over and the sides must get to a solution where there is one reliable, usable version of the evidence. She asked the defense to identify the problematic and/or missing files and how many different versions they have of the files.

“Evidence has to be what it is, and if people have multiple versions of something, there is no reliability in what is being put forward,” said Kite.

Kite said she will be making this a priority case for her calendar so these issues can be resolved faster, as both sides will be back in court April 8. As it stands, the case is still set for trial in October.