Judge Orders Mail Bomb Suspect Held Without Bail : Crime: The Georgia man faces separate charges of witness tampering. Prosecutors are barred from mentioning the blasts that killed two.

MACON, Ga. —  A federal judge on Friday ordered a man who has been the focus of an investigation into fatal mail bombings held without bail until his trial on unrelated charges of witness tampering.

Judge Wilbur D. Owens Jr. set a tentative trial date of Sept. 17 for Walter Leroy Moody Jr., 56.

He ruled that Moody’s wife, Susan McBride Moody, 28, could be released on a $250,000 property bond.

The Moodys were arrested Tuesday and charged in a 13-count federal indictment with conspiracy, obstruction of justice, subornation of perjury, bribery of a witness and tampering with a witness.

The charges arose from Moody’s attempts to erase a 1972 conviction for possession of a pipe bomb. The bomb injured his then-wife, Hazel.

Thursday’s session of the bail hearing featured secretly videotaped meetings in March and April between the Moodys and Julie Linn West of Atlanta. The government contends that she was one of two women the Moodys bribed and intimidated into providing Moody with a concocted alibi for the bombing.

The materials used in the pipe bomb explosion reportedly were similar to those found in four December mail bombs, two of which killed a federal judge and a lawyer in December.

At one point Friday, Owens closed the hearing after a prosecutor mentioned the mail bombings that killed 11th Circuit Judge Robert S. Vance of Birmingham, Ala., and Savannah, Ga., lawyer Robert Robinson. The other bombs went to the 11th Circuit courthouse in Birmingham and to the Jacksonville, Fla., office of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People.

Letters attributed the mail bombs to a racist hate group.

Bruce Harvey, Moody’s attorney, has contended that the indictment is a consolation prize for prosecutors who have been unable to indict Moody in the mail bombings despite six months of investigation.

After an hourlong closed hearing with Harvey and prosecutors, Owen returned to open court and ruled that attorneys in the Moodys’ current trial could not discuss potential evidence in the mail-bombings case.

“The charges in this court do not involve the bombings the government has mentioned,” Owens said, noting neither Moody nor his wife has been indicted in the bombings. “When and if they are indicted, that is a matter that will be taken up.”