A hearing was held on Tuesday morning in Ted DiBiase Jr.’s fraud case. PWInsider reports that the hearing took place before the Mississippi Southern District Court, which was held to confirm that the current trial date of August 26th is still set and that the case is moving forward. DiBiase was not present for the hearing, at which the Court told all parties that they will be requiring regular status conferences moving forward.
As previously reported, the trial in the WWE alumnus’ case was was set for August 26th after it had been previously delayed. DiBiase Jr. was charged in April with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and to commit theft concerning programs receiving federal funds, six counts of wire fraud, two counts of theft concerning programs receiving federal funds, and four counts of money laundering in the Mississippi Welfare fraud scandal. He has pled not guilty and the trial was originally scheduled to start on June 20th before the government filed a motion asking for a delay due to the massive amount of discovery that both sides needed to review.
The charges are related to the scandal regarding misappropriation of funds from the Mississippi Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) programs. If convicted, DiBiase Jr. faces maximum penalty of five years for the charge of conspiracy, a maximum of 20 years for each wire fraud count, and a penalty of 10 years for each count of theft and each count of money laundering.
