Kalen Schlatter pleaded not guilty to the first-degree murder of 22-year-old Tess Richey before a pool of potential jurors Friday morning.

Superior Court Justice Michael Dambrot said the jury selection process will proceed with the use of peremptory challenges, in keeping with Thursday’s bombshell Court of Appeal ruling. The challenges allow both Crown and defence lawyers to reject a specific number of potential jurors without having to give a reason.

The decision found changes by the federal government to the jury selection process that end the use of peremptory challenges should not have applied to cases where an accused chose to be tried by a jury before the law came into effect last fall.

However, in Ontario some judges ruled the new jury selection process should be used — which means several cases, including those involving murder and sexual assault convictions, may now be retried.

A jury is expected to be selected in the Schlatter case by early next week, with the trial starting Thursday, Dambrot told the potential jurors. The trial is expected to last four to six weeks.

Richey was reported missing to police by her family on Nov. 25, 2017. She was last seen in Toronto’s Gay Village that night.

Richey’s mother, who had driven to Toronto from North Bay to search for her daughter, found her body four days later in an alleyway outside an under-construction building near where she was last seen alive.

Schlatter, now 23, was arrested on Feb. 4, 2018.

Richey’s case, along with other missing-persons investigations linked to the city’s Gay Village and the victims of serial killer Bruce McArthur, prompted Toronto police to order an independent review into how the force handles missing-persons reports. The review is ongoing and is expected to end next year.

Toronto police launched a new missing-persons unit in July 2018.

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