Boulder, CO (CSTV U-WIRE) -- Two CU-Boulder athletes suspected of sending a racially charged hate e-mail to a fellow student had their court appearances waived Monday, but are now awaiting pre-trial conferences.

The arraignments for CU students Jacqueline Zeigle and Clint O'Neal were vacated after their individual attorneys sent in their entries for appearance.

"Lawyers entered on both cases and the arraignments were vacated like they would be on any case and it will be set for a pre-trial conference," said Ken Kupfner, chief deputy district attorney for the City of Boulder. "The pre-trial conference is just an opportunity for the defense lawyer and the prosecutor to sit down and talk about the case and try and get a feel for where it's going from there."

On Dec. 4, Greg Castro, a CU cross-country runner, received a message over Facebook.com containing racial epithets and violent threats from O'Neal, a member of CU's football team, and Zeigle, also a CU cross-country runner. Castro is Hispanic and Zeigle and O'Neal are white. The message was sent from O'Neal's account.

A message from O'Neal's account was also sent to Stephen Pifer, another cross-country runner.

On Dec. 11, the CU athletic department issued a press release stating that O'Neal had been suspended from the football team and Zeigle had informed the athletic department of her intention to leave the cross-country program effective immediately, citing "personal reasons."

O'Neal has been suspended indefinitely and cannot participate in team activities, including practices, workouts and CU's upcoming bowl game.

Kupfner said no discussions have taken place between the defense lawyers and prosecutors yet, and no date for the pre-trial conferences has been set.

O'Neal's attorney, Louis Rubino, is out of town and Zeigle's attorney Philip Bienvenu, from Student Legal Services at CU, did not return phone calls from the Colorado Daily on Monday.

"After the pre-trail conference typically a case is either set for a dispositional hearing if there's an agreement reached to have the person appear in front of the judge and enter their guilty plea and be sentenced, or if it's not set for a dispositional hearing, if there's not an agreement on the case, it's set for a case management conference and you appear in front of the judge and get your trial setting," he said.

Zeigle told the Colorado Daily recently that she and O'Neal regret sending the message to Castro.

"It's not like we're happy about what we did, or we are saying what we did was OK," she said.

(C) 2005 Colorado Daily via CSTV U-WIRE