I'm not an attorney blackglass3, but I have a decent amount of schooling in the subject as I'm working on my 3rd criminal justice/forensics degree at the moment. Believe me, just like anything else, I am certainly wrong a lot too (just ask my wife
).
To answer your question---I think the process is going to take awhile due to the complexities of the 2 cases, the fact that they were linked with many of the same players, witnesses, etc. The defense is the side who are going to drag their heels because they are going to want to try and get evidence and testimony thrown out, which will take some time due to the scheduling of the different dates, appearances, etc. On top of that, they have to go through all of the mountains of evidence that the prosecution has, which is reported to be over 50 DVD's that have interviews, camera footage from the night, and questioning of witnesses on them. I would imagine that is doubled due to the fact that there are 2 cases, so there is likely a massive amount of paperwork, testimony, camera footage, etc.
The fact that you bring up re: the billable hourly rate isn't probably "the" main reason, but I would imagine that the defense attorneys and all of their expert witness aren't too mad just the same