The trial of former Bre-X geologist John Felderhof, involving a gold mining fraud that cost investors billions of dollars in 1997, will resume on December 6.

Justice Peter Hryn of Ontario Superior Court approved the tentative schedule today, providing for two weeks of December hearings.

After a break next January and most of February, the trial will resume Feb. 28 and run through to May 20, 2005 — about 4½ years after the trial first hit the courts.

Felderhof has pleaded not guilty to eight charges of insider trading and misleading investors.

Bre-X shares collapsed eight years ago as a gold deposit dubbed the world’s largest was exposed as a hoax.

The trial has been on hold since April 2001, when the Ontario Securities Commission tried to remove the trial judge, claiming that Hryn had shown bias against the prosecution.

The Ontario Court of Appeal ruled against the OSC.