The federal trial of a New Hampshire man accused of trying to kill his wife in a staged break-in at a Saco home in 2014 has been postponed from its scheduled start date in January until at least February.

Jury selection for the trial of Gregory Owens, 59, had been set to begin Monday in U.S. District Court in Portland, with opening statements for the trial to start on Jan. 26.

Maine State Police and Saco police investigating the home invasion at 24 Hillview Ave. in Saco found a boot print in a flower bed and a type of 9 mm shell casing that authorities say helped put Gregory Owens at the crime scene and led to his arrest. Whitney Hayward/Staff Photographer

But Owens’ attorney, Sarah Churchill, was granted a request on Wednesday to postpone the trial to allow her expert witness, forensic scientist Heather Coyle, more time to review hundreds of pages of DNA evidence that could play an important role in the trial.

The new jury selection date is now tentatively set for Feb. 1 with the trial starting as soon as the day afterward, Churchill said by phone.

Owens, who lived in Londonderry, New Hampshire, is accused of breaking into a house at 25 Hillview Ave. in Saco on Dec. 18, 2014, where his wife, Rachel Owens, had been staying with friends Carol and Steve Chabot. Authorities say Owens wore a black ski mask, obscuring his identity, as he shot his wife three times, including once in the head. He is also accused of shooting Steve Chabot three times in the torso through a bedroom door. Both survived.

Investigators collected DNA evidence from Owens after he was stopped by New Hampshire State Police less than three hours after the shooting as he was driving in Hudson, New Hampshire. They also collected DNA evidence from bloodstains on the steering wheel and armrest of Owens’ Hyundai Santa Fe sport utility vehicle that matched a DNA sample taken from a swab from a broken window on the rear garage door of the Chabots’ home, according to a report by FBI Agent Pamela Flick filed with the court to obtain search warrants in the investigation.

Owens is a former Army marksman who investigators believe tried to kill his wife after his girlfriend in Wisconsin threatened to expose their affair.

Churchill said in her motion that she had been unable to hire Coyle as an expert witness until Nov. 5 because her client’s money was temporarily held up as part of his wife’s divorce proceeding against him.

“She got a late start,” Churchill said of Coyle’s preparations to testify at trial.

The trial is expected to take two weeks once it begins. Owens is charged with two federal counts — interstate domestic violence, punishable by up to 20 years in prison, and using a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence, punishable by up to life in prison.

Owens also faces multiple state charges, including aggravated attempted murder. His trial on those charges in York County Superior Court in Alfred has not been set and depends in part on the outcome of the federal trial.

The prosecutor in the federal case, Assistant U.S. Attorney Darcie McElwee, wrote in her trial brief filed this week that she expects to call on approximately 40 witnesses to testify for the government.

“Evidence linking the defendant to the crimes which will be presented at trial includes footprint analysis, DNA analysis, contradictory statements made by the defendant after the shooting to police and his mistress, jail call recordings and physical evidence from the scene and from the defendant’s home in Londonderry,” McElwee wrote.

Churchill said in her federal trial brief that she expects to call 10 defense witnesses.

“Defendant Owens intends to rely on a defense of general denial, the presumption of innocence, and holding the Government to its burden of proof,” Churchill wrote.