Attorneys were back in federal court in Sacramento on Wednesday for the first time in nine months.
The next hearing is scheduled for December, and prosecutor Robert Twiss says a trial isn't likely for at least another year after that.
Awaiting trial are a retired Army lieutenant colonel and 10 members of California's Hmong community.
Former Army officer and Yolo County ombudsman Harrison Jack is charged with assisting Hmong community leaders, including former Laotian General Vang Pao, in the plot against the communist government of Laos.
Defense attorneys are reviewing 37,000 pages of evidence and audio tapes of secretly recorded meetings between the alleged coup leaders and an undercover agent who posed as an arms dealer.
An undercover agent on Feb. 7 secretly recorded a luncheon meeting with Jack, Vang Pao and 10 associates at a Thai restaurant a few blocks from the state Capitol in Sacramento. They then walked to a recreational vehicle parked nearby to examine machine guns, grenade launchers, anti-tank rockets, anti-personnel mines and other weapons.
On Feb. 15, Jack called the agent to report that the plot was "in motion," according to the affidavit. Hmong leaders had agreed to buy $9.8 million worth of military weapons, Jack said in a recorded conversation, with much of the money coming from immigrants throughout the United States.
Jack, a native Woodlander, was the first ombudsman hired by Yolo County. County officials were happy with the appointment, and praised his previous experience as an adjunct professor with Golden Gate University, where he taught strategic planning, executive and operations management, and critical reasoning.
Jack had recently established the Hmong Emergency Relief Organization, a nonprofit organization committed to support of the Hmong community here and abroad, around the time he was arrested.
