NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- A question has perplexed those involved in the Marcia Trimble case ever since the arrest of Jerome Barrett: Why didn't anyone notice the African-American man in all-white Green Hills in 1975?

Charlotte, a Belmont University student, was attacked just two days before 9-year-old Marcia disappeared. She barely survived, but she fought off Barrett after looking him in the eye.

"My neck was cut open three times with the knife, and I was pushed face first ... and my back was jumped up and down on several times," said Charlotte, who identified Barrett as her attacker. "I looked him right into his face."

What was unknown was that Charlotte's permanent home was in Green Hills. Her parents' back yard actually touched the Trimbles'.

Barrett is accused of killing Marcia and set to go on trial in her death.

Now, after connecting the dots in October 1975, police have a reason Barrett was in Green Hills the day Marcia disappeared.

Yet, this theory may never be heard by the jury. Judge Steve Dozier must decide if its relevancy will overcome how much dictates the jury's feelings about Barrett.

"It puts him at the crime scene. It gives him the opportunity," said defense attorney Jim Todd. "I think it's overly prejudicial, and I think the court will probably exclude it."

That's just one of three big decisions Dozier will make Friday about evidence. Also up for decision is whether he'll allow Charlotte's attack and the theory of Barrett in the Green Hills neighborhood, the facts of the Sarah Des Prez murder and the so-called jailhouse snitch testimony in which a jailmate contends Barrett said he didn't rape Marcia but did kill her.

Barrett was convicted in January of killing Des Prez, a Vanderbilt University student, whose body was found just weeks before Trimble was killed in 1975.