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By Roxana Hegeman

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — As the case of the man accused of being the BTK serial killer moves through the legal system, one issue is sure to come up: Can Dennis Rader get a fair trial in a city shaken by the killings for three decades?

Rader was charged Tuesday with 10 counts of first-degree murder and is being held on a $10 million bond for the "Bind, Torture, Kill" murders beginning in 1974.

His three public defenders did not return telephone calls seeking comment, but one of Rader's attorneys also told a local television station that he planned to seek a competency hearing.

Experts say the attorneys are also likely to file a motion requesting the trial be moved out of Wichita, where media coverage has been intense.

Rader's arrest was jubilantly announced before the families of the BTK victims in a televised news conference in which Wichita Police Chief Norman Williams set off applause by declaring: "The bottom line: BTK is arrested."

"It would be hard for anybody to get a fair trial if it is preceded by an hour-long publicly broadcast infomercial about law enforcement opinions about the accused's guilt," said Wichita attorney Dan Monnat.

Still, experts say any change-of-venue request is unlikely to gain much traction. The tactic has not worked in other high-profile Wichita cases — such as the trial of Jonathan and Reginald Carr, two brothers convicted in a crime spree that left five Wichita residents dead.

"I don't recall a case ever having a change of venue here," said Jay Greeno, the attorney who represented Reginald Carr in that case.

A competency hearing, meanwhile, would determine whether Rader is able to understand what is happening and be able to assist in his defense.

Howard Brodsky, a Wichita psychologist who has been involved in several thousand competency hearings, said attorneys often use them to determine if an insanity defense would be useful.

"The vast majority of insanity defenses do not work in front of the jury," he said. "Sedgwick County, in particular, has a low rate of juries buying insanity defenses."

Rader's preliminary hearing has been set for March 15, although the district attorney's office said it expects the hearing to be postponed.

If Rader does not waive his right to a preliminary hearing, prosecutors will lay out in a sort of "mini-trial" with enough evidence to meet the minimal standard of probable cause needed to proceed to trial.

If there is a trial, one issue that's likely to come up is the quality of the DNA from 30-year-old crime scenes.

"The samples that were taken were collected before DNA evidence was being used," Greeno said. "You have to look at the possibility of degradation of samples, the possibility of cross contamination."