An aspiring rapper on trial over what authorities say was a note threatening a Virginia Tech-like killing spree set off "alarm bells" days before the writings surfaced on his college campus by pressing to get firepower he ordered from a gun dealer, a prosecutor told jurors Wednesday.

But an attorney for Olutosin Oduwole countered during a trial's opening statements in the 4-year-old case that his gun-loving client stood wrongly accused, saying the words at issue were innocent lyrics and other musings by a performer prone to compulsively log all of his thoughts on paper.

"This case is a very selective case," Justin Kuehn said on behalf of Oduwole, accused of attempting to make a terroristic threat and a weapons count linked to the loaded handgun police found a short time later in July 2007 in Oduwole's on-campus apartment at Southern Illinois University in Edwardsville.

"That 'note' is nothing more than a piece of scrap paper with private thoughts, the beginning of a song," Kuehn insisted. "Their key piece of evidence, the center point of their case, is a song."

Wednesday's differing scenarios by the prosecutors and defense previewed testimony that could leave jurors with a key decision: Whether Oduwole's questioned writings — found in his out-of-gas car just months after the Virginia Tech rampage that left 32 people dead along with the gunman — represented something potentially sinister or were lyrical stylings that were constitutionally protected free speech.

Kuehn told the all-white jury that witnesses on Oduwole's behalf may include what the defense describes as an expert in the study of rap and hip-hop music, along with that genre's culture.

The trial's stakes are high: Oduwole, 26 and free on bond, faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted of the threat-related count.

A couple accused in a deadly crime spree through the Northwest pleaded not guilty Wednesday to two counts of aggravated murder.

David "Joey" Pedersen and Holly Grigsby wore orange jail uniforms during their separate appearances at Snohomish County Superior Court in Everett, about 30 miles north of Seattle. Several family members attended the hearing, holding hands as they entered the courtroom.

The couple is charged in the deaths of Pedersen's father, David "Red" Pedersen, and his wife, Leslie Pedersen, in Everett around Sept. 26.

In interviews with a reporter and police, the couple said they killed Pedersen's father because he molested two young relatives. They also said they killed his wife because she knew about the abuse and still supported him.

Everett police have emphasized that investigators haven't confirmed the defendants' story. However, Snohomish County Deputy Prosecutor Craig Matheson wrote in a probable cause statement that Grigsby confessed during a five-hour, videotaped interview with Oregon state police.

A judge on Wednesday set trial for Dec. 2, although that is likely to be postponed. The prosecutor has until Nov. 14 to decide whether to seek the death penalty, although that date also could be extended.

South Carolina's Supreme Court has agreed take a case challenging the state's authority to conduct the GOP's first-in-the-South presidential primary in January.

Papers are due in court next week.

Beaufort, Chester, Greenville and Spartanburg counties says the state Election Commission lacks the authority to run the primary and that it can't force them to pick up part of the tab.

The counties estimate the primary will cost $2 million, with state and the state Republican Party picking up about $1.3 million or about 65 percent.

State Attorney General Alan Wilson agreed the state Supreme Court should take up the case. Wilson argues the state has the authority to run the primary because it was included in the state budget law.

Lawyers for a man sentenced to death for killing a University of North Dakota student submitted a document Tuesday for what is considered the final step in the legal appeals process, claiming his trial team was ineffective and that the man is mentally disabled.

The 298-page document, a so-called habeas corpus motion, was filed in federal court for Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., who was convicted of kidnapping resulting in the death of Dru Sjodin of Pequot Lakes, Minn. Rodriguez, 58, of Crookston, Minn., is being held on death row at a federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind.

The appeal was filed by attorney Joseph Margulies, a Northwestern University law professor who has represented several death row inmates. U.S. attorneys in the case depicted Rodriguez "as little better than an animal, uncaring and unworthy," Margulies said.

"We now know this carefully scripted tale conceals much and reveals little. Little about the government's case, and even less about Alfonso Rodriguez, was true," the document says. "In the pages that follow, we describe in meticulous detail the difference between what was and what could have been."

Federal prosecutors were not immediately available for comment.