Two decades after the October 2002 murder of Run-DMC member Jam Master Jay, his two alleged killers will go to trial in February 2023. Billboard reports two of his accused killers, Karl Jordan, Jr. and Ronald Washington, will head to trial early next year.

The two men were charged with Jay’s murder in August 2020, and attempted to argue that because of the long delay they wouldn’t be able to defend themselves. Specifically, Jordan claimed that cell phone evidence that could properly defend his case was no longer available. However, Judge LaShann DeArcy Hall disagreed, calling Jordan and Washington’s arguments “speculative,” and said that the two must head to court.

“Conspicuously absent from Jordan’s argument is any factual support for his claim,” the judge wrote. “In the absence of any factual support, the court has no idea what Jordan believes the phone records contain, how they could conceivably contradict the Government’s evidence, and how those contradictions could conceivably demonstrate that Jordan did not commit the crime.”

The judge continued, “That memories will dim, witnesses become inaccessible, and evidence be lost are not in themselves enough to demonstrate that defendants cannot receive a fair trial,” DeArcy Hall added. “While Washington goes on at length regarding errors in memory, he ignores that those are also problems for the Government.”

Jam Master Jay, whose real name was Jason Mizell, was gunned down in 2002. The case remained unsolved for two decades but in 2020, federal prosecutors charged Jordan and Washington with the killing.