ALFRED – A Biddeford man has moved to withdraw his guilty plea to the 1998 murder of a 79-year-old woman whom prosecutors said was bound with duct tape, beaten and left to die.

Christopher Wynne, 20, pleaded guilty last summer in the slaying of Claire Emerson and is being held at the Windham Correctional Facility while awaiting sentencing.

A hearing on Wynne’s motion is scheduled for Thursday in York County Superior Court. Wynne also is scheduled to ask Justice Roland Cole to change his lawyer, according to court records.

It is not clear what prompted Wynne’s requests.

His lawyer, Christopher Northrop of Wells, would neither confirm nor deny that such motions will be heard in court Thursday. He said nothing had been filed officially as of Tuesday afternoon.

“I’m not really sure what’s going to happen,” Northrop said.

According to prosecutors, Wynne and a friend, Robert Diffin, 17, broke into Emerson’s house Dec. 10, 1998, after spotting her keys in the door and her purse on the kitchen table. They stole the purse and took her car.

The next day, prosecutors said, Wynne returned to Emerson’s house alone, bound her to a bedpost and beat her to death.

Wynne and Diffin returned to Emerson’s house Dec. 14, removed her body, wrapped it in blankets, drove to Dayton and threw it into a brook, police said.

The two were arrested after they were spotted driving around Biddeford in Emerson’s car and tried to forge Emerson’s signature on her checks.

Diffin pleaded guilty in 1999 to charges of burglary and helping to remove the body. Diffin, who agreed to testify against Wynne, was sentenced to six months in jail.