San Diego

Bail was set at $1 million Friday for a Pacific Beach man charged with fatally beating his former girlfriend with a concrete block as she slept.

John James Campbell, 35, pleaded innocent to the murder charge in the death Wednesday of Patricia Joanne Pekny, 28, a nursery school teacher.

Campbell had been arraigned Tuesday on attempted murder and mayhem charges, but those were dropped and the murder charge added Friday after she died.

Police reportedly found Campbell near Pekny’s apartment on Grand Avenue Aug. 11 carrying a blood-stained concrete block and wearing bloody gloves around 3:30 a.m. The woman was in critical condition in a hospital for three days and was pronounced brain dead on Aug. 14.

Judge Robert Stahl Jr. ordered Campbell to appear at an Aug. 27 preliminary hearing.

His attorney, Elliot Lande, said Campbell was a student at San Diego State University in a pre-law program and is a former Marine. Campbell was currently working in a bookstore.