DETROIT (CNN) -- Assisted suicide advocate Jack Kevorkian will be in a Michigan courtroom Wednesday for a preliminary hearing on first-degree murder and assisted suicide charges.

And, contrary to previous reports, he will have a team of lawyers with him.

Kevorkian was arraigned two weeks ago on charges of first-degree murder, criminal assistance to a suicide, and delivery of a controlled substance in the September 17 death of Thomas Youk, a 52-year-old man with Lou Gehrig's disease.

Youk's death was seen by about 15.3 million households on CBS' "60 Minutes" last month.

Kevorkian set up the interview and story to force Michigan authorities into a showdown over the state's law banning assisted suicide, which went into effect September 1.

The assisted suicide charge could draw the strongest challenge from Kevorkian's legal team. They could try to force prosecutors to choose between the murder and suicide charge, arguing that death cannot be both a murder and a suicide.

Kevorkian decides against representing himself

The retired pathologist, 70, will not present his own case, as he had indicated earlier.

He had said he would represent himself, breaking with his longtime lawyer Geoffrey Feiger, whose belligerent style helped convince three juries to find Kevorkian innocent and prompted the judge in a fourth trial to call a mistrial.

Feiger himself predicted disaster if Kevorkian represented himself.

"I can tell you what the results will be if he represents himself," Feiger said last month. "He will go to jail and starve."

"He has a constitutional right to make a fool of himself, and the prosecutor will make him look like a fool," he said.

Kevorkian's legal adviser, David Gorosh, said he will cross-examine the prosecution's witnesses during the preliminary hearing and ask the court to let another lawyer, Lisa Dwyer, assist him. Both are former public defenders. Fieger will be absent from the team.

Kevorkian also has asked Robert Sedler, a Wayne State University professor of law, and Brad Feldman, a lawyer who passed the bar a month ago, to help his case.

Kevorkian had originally said he wanted to waive his preliminary hearing, but Gorosh said he and the other advisers convinced Kevorkian it would be better to force the prosecution to illustrate probable cause on all counts.

Prosecutor confidant of charges

Oakland County assistant prosecutor John Skrzynski, who will handle the case, said he felt certain Kevorkian would be ordered to stand trial on all charges.

"We charged both for two different aspects of what he did," Skrzynski said. "It started as an assisted suicide and turned into a murder."

"Obviously, the defense has a plausible argument," said Yale Kamisar, a law professor at the University of Michigan who has studied euthanasia cases. "It will hinge on how broadly or narrowly (the judge) interprets this law."

The law passed earlier this year only mentions murder in reference to coercing someone to commit suicide.

On tape, Youk is shown sitting while a figure -- Kevorkian's face is not shown -- injects him with drugs to put him to sleep and stop his heart.

Kamisar said his research shows juries are reluctant to convict people who commit euthanasia of murder, and often look for compromise positions, such as manslaughter.

"There's more support for this for people who are motivated by mercy or trying to relieve someone's pain," he said. "I think (a first-degree murder conviction) is a long shot."

Sedler declined to say whether the defense would challenge the assisted suicide charge Wednesday.

"Any time there is one act and there are three charges, there is always an issue whether the prosecution can sustain three charges for the same act," he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.