An Alabama man accused of directing a murder-for-hire conspiracy that resulted in killings in Kentucky and Alabama pleaded innocent Wednesday in federal court in Bowling Green. U.S. Magistrate Judge E. Robert Goebel appointed two lawyers to represent Charles Stewart, 55, of Eva, Ala. Two other defendants Billy Joe Lyon, 19, of Evansville, Ind., and Richard Timrod Dorman, 62, of Sulphur Springs, Texas are to be arraigned today in Owensboro. After eluding arrest for more than a year, Stewart was caught May 25 near his Eva home and is charged in the Feb. 7, 1999, kidnapping-murder of James Nichols of Eva. He also must stand trial for a similar crime that occurred a month earlier in Kentucky. Stewart, Dorman and Billy Joe Lyon were charged in a new indictment issued June 7 that charged Dorman in the conspiracy and added some bank fraud charges, the U.S. attorneys office said Wednesday. A grand jury indictment alleges that Stewart hired two of his relatives, Lyon and Lyons father, Larry Lyon, 42, of Henderson, now deceased, to kill a reclusive Robards, Ky., farmer, Aaron Jack Norris, in January 1999. Norris was lured outside his home and beaten to death with an iron stake and a pick ax, according to an indictment. The Lyons were then to steal Nichols identification, cash, deeds, checks and other property, according to the indictment. In Alabama, Nichols and his mother, Florence Nichols, were kidnapped, beaten and robbed at their Eva home. Nichols died from the beating and Florence Nichols was left for dead but found alive. The Nicholses were found in the back of a partially submerged van in a rock quarry lake near their home. The Lyons allegedly hired Dorman to sell the Kentucky farmers property and withdraw funds from his bank accounts. Dorman cashed a $1,100 check on Norris account, according to court records. A June 7 indictment alleges Stewart instructed the Lyons to kill Dorman, whose image had been captured by bank surveillance cameras. The Lyons abducted him at gunpoint, put him in his car and tried to drown him in Green River in western Kentucky, according to court records.