Nine former Beta Theta Pi brothers received their trial dates for involvement in the hazing death of Penn State student Tim Piazza in February of 2017, according to a court order released earlier this week.

There will be three trials — the first two in February and the final in April — consisting of no more than four defendants at a time, eliminating the chaos that ensued during the first preliminary hearing that ran the course of the entire summer of 2017 and was the subject of criticism from prosecution.

However, that same prosecutor — former Centre County District Attorney Stacy Parks Miller, who is no longer involved since losing her reelection bid in 2017 — bashed the decision to separate the trials instead of letting one jury hear the case.  

Judge Brian Marshall, who granted the motion, said in the order that the reasoning behind holding separate trials was to avoid playing a blame game among defendants, according to a snippet of the order released on Twitter by the Centre Daily Times‘ Bret Pallotto.

“While the defense is not entirely antagonistic, it will be somewhat prejudicial to defendants [Daniel] Casey and [Brendan Young] to have to defend against, not only the case presented by the Office of the Attorney General, but also the blame thrown upon them by their co-defendants, ” the order reads.

The order also cites Rule 583 of the Rules of Criminal Procedure, which states, “The court may order separate trials of offenses or defendants, or provide other appropriate relief, if it appears that any party may be prejudiced by offenses or defendants being tried together.”

Young, the fraternity’s former president, and Casey, the fraternity’s former rush chair, will be the two lone former brothers to face trial in April. Each faces 30 counts of hazing and conspiracy to commit hazing charges — more than all the counts combined for the other defendants scheduled for trial. They allegedly played a significant role in planning the bid acceptance activities on the night Piazza fell down the stairs and no one called medical attention until the next morning.

Full List of Trials and Defendants

February 6-13:

• Michael Fernandez: Hazing (two counts) and unlawful acts relative to liquor (two counts)
• Brian Gelb: Hazing (six counts) and unlawful acts relative to liquor (five counts)
• Donald Prior: Hazing (four counts) and unlawful acts relative to liquor (three counts)

February 14 – March 1

• Michael Bonatucci: Conspiracy to commit hazing (one count)
• Nicholas Kubera: Conspiracy to commit hazing (one count)
• Joshua Kurczewski: Conspiracy to commit hazing (one count)
• Jonah Neuman: Conspiracy to commit hazing (one count)

April 3-30

• Daniel Casey: Hazing (29 counts) and conspiracy to commit hazing (one count)
• Brendan Young: Hazing (29 counts) and conspiracy to commit hazing (one count)

Following the recovery of the deleted video footage from the Beta Theta Pi house, the case reached its peak with 26 former brothers facing charges. More serious charges like involuntary manslaughter and aggravated assault were eventually removed from the case, some by a judge’s dismissal and some after prosecutors dropped the charges.

Alongside the nine defendants scheduled for trial, six former brothers have entered guilty pleas and another is scheduled to plead guilty. Four former brothers were accepted in September into a accelerated rehabilitative disposition (ARD) program. Braxton Becker, who is accused of deleting the video footage and charged with tampering with evidence, has another preliminary hearing next week.