Former Governor Bryant subpoenaed in case involving Brett Favre, as state dismisses its own attorney, with no reason given, while he was investigating wrongdoing at the very top.
A widening Mississippi $94 million welfare fund scandal is growing once again, with more twists than a country road. The Mississippi welfare fraud that already involves Brett Favre, the ex-NFL football star, has now pulled in former Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant.
Further complications in this welfare scheme include the news that the recently terminated lead attorney in the case, who had been investigating the welfare scandal, was fired without cause, on the same day he was going to serve the same subpoena as the state to the former governor!
Current Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves told media outlets on July 23 that he was part of the decision-making to dismiss attorney Brad Pigott, who was actively investigating the scandal.
The termination of attorney Brad Pigott by the state is expected to add more legal layers to the mushrooming Mississippi Welfare department’s civil lawsuit. The welfare agency had publicly sworn to investigate the welfare scam and offer the public answers that a criminal investigation would not address. Now, the investigation must ask: Why was Pigott fired?
The state’s lead attorney, Pigott, was handling the investigation into the welfare fraud, including alleged participants Favre and Bryant. But Pigott was terminated by the state of Mississippi on the same day the subpoena to Bryant was filed by the state and not Pigott due to his dismissal.
Pigott, a former US attorney, told the Mississippi Today news that he had been offered no cause for his termination but was told it was not due to the quality of his work. Pigott told the press that he believes his dismissal was politically motivated.
“All I did, and I believe all that caused me to be terminated from representing the department or having anything to do with the litigation, was to try to get the truth about all of that,” Pigott told the Mississippi Today. “People are going to go to jail over this, at least the state should be willing to find out the truth of what happened.”
The new subpoena sent to past governor Bryant was requested by attorneys for the defendants in yet another welfare fraud case. The subpoena asks the former governor to offer up legal documents relating to the funding of a $5 million University of Southern Mississippi volleyball center.
The increasingly crowded fraud case was publicized first by the newspaper Mississippi Today, which shared its investigation with the public.
In April, the newspaper published an article based upon its investigation into the welfare scandal allegedly involving Favre and Bryant.
The paper wrote that Bryant was assisting Favre in a business called ‘Prevacus” only a few days before the firm received $2 million in welfare funds.
The $2 million in funds came from a close friend of past First Lady Deborah Bryant, Nancy New. New was given full authority to spend tens of millions of Mississippi Department of Human Services funds. She ran the non-profit Mississippi Community Education Center at the time and also sat on the USM Athletic Foundation board, and sent the funds to the USM Athletic Foundation to fund the new stadium.
However, under Mississippi law, federal TANF block grants cannot be used for brick-and-mortar buildings or other projects.
Nancy New and her son, Zach New, pled guilty as part of their plea agreement to numerous state charges in the $5 million scam, including bribery and wire fraud.
Court documents show that Zach New told the court he “acted with” his mother Nancy New and “others, at their direction, to disguise the USM construction project as a ‘lease’ as a means of circumventing the limited purpose grant’s strict prohibition against ‘brick and mortar’ construction projects in violation of Miss. Code Ann. 97-7-10.”
