Since he was arrested nearly six years ago for diverting millions of federal welfare dollars away from the needy, former Mississippi Department of Human Services director John Davis took the witness stand for the first time Friday.
He is the fourth witness to testify in the trial of a man he said he loved, former WWE wrestler Ted “Teddy” DiBiase Jr., who received more than $3 million in welfare funds during Davis’ administration. The testimony was dominated by Davis’ text messages with DiBiase and others, displayed in the courtroom using a projector.
“There is nothing you could ever do to make me not love you,” read one text from Davis to the wrestler.
The two men even came up with a catchphrase using a combination of their names, “#DaViase4Lyfe,” which they’d sometimes use at the end of their text messages. Like “Bennifer,” the prosecutor noted.
The story told through the texts is one of a bromance with a tragic end. Davis is awaiting federal sentencing for conspiracy and theft and in DiBiase’s trial for conspiracy, wire fraud, theft and money laundering, he could face decades if convicted on all 13 counts.
But after six hours of showing Davis text after text, the federal government hadn’t finished with him. And the defense hadn’t taken their turn to question Davis. What the court heard Friday is an incomplete account from Davis. He is scheduled to return to the stand Monday.
Still, the prosecution did start to prod at one of the case’s main mysteries: Davis’ motive.
Davis testified that his introduction to the DiBiase family was through the youngest brother, Brett DiBiase, then a Toshiba salesman who had also been a wrestler. They’d run into each other having lunch one day and Brett DiBiase’s relative, a lobbyist, introduced the men. The agency quickly hired Brett DiBiase and he and the director became “very, very close,” Davis said.
“Were you in love with him?” Assistant U.S. Attorney John Meynardie asked.
“I loved him but not ‘in love’ with him if you’re asking the way I think you’re asking,” Davis responded. “I had no sexual desire toward Brett, but I loved him a whole lot.”
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Brett DiBiase soon introduced Davis to his brother and his father, Ted DiBiase Sr., another former WWE star who ran an evangelical Christian ministry called Heart of David. Davis exercised unilateral control over the spending of a roughly $1 billion state agency, and they all began working together.
Davis testified that his agency contracted with Heart of David to satisfy a faith-based initiative that then-Gov. Phil Bryant, Davis’ boss, wanted the agency to support.
Around this time, Davis had also begun pushing tens of millions of federal welfare dollars to two nonprofits – Mississippi Community Education Center and Family Resource Center – to run a nebulous statewide anti-poverty initiative called Families First for Mississippi. Meynardie asked if this was part of Republican Bryant’s directive to “privatize” the agency.
“The administration liked to call it consolidation because it sounds better,” Davis said.
But after the nonprofits received the funding, Davis testified that he often dictated what they did with the money, including giving it to his wrestler friends.
After a while of employing Brett DiBiase, Davis said, “it became really difficult for me to sit on Brett, because he was so high-strung.”
Brett DiBiase was in recovery from drug addiction when they met, Davis said, but he relapsed. Davis dropped Brett DiBiase as an employee of his agency and helped get him a job at one of the Families First nonprofits instead. The wrestler’s salary jumped from under $100,000 at the state to $250,000 at Mississippi Community Education Center.
Davis also testified that he accompanied Brett DiBiase on a trip to New Orleans to visit DiBiase’s extramarital girlfriend and twice on runs to meet the wrestler’s drug dealer. The prosecution asked directly if Davis had sexual relations with the younger brother and Davis said he had not. When Brett DiBiase agreed to return to rehab, he went to a luxury treatment facility in Malibu, California, on the nonprofit’s dime.
Had the nonprofits attempted to cut off the spigot to Brett DiBiase, Davis testified he would have tried to talk to them to keep the payments flowing.
“The million dollar question: Why?” Meynardie asked.
This is when Davis explained that he had no spouse, no children and few friends – a hazard, he said, of working at the state agency – and that Brett DiBiase, “he was like, I was going to say a brother, but more like a child.”
Throughout 2017, Davis began turning his attention – and finances – to the older brother, Teddy DiBiase, who lavished Davis with words.
“I don’t have enough room nor adequate words to describe the amazingness that makes up the DNA of your very being,” DiBiase once texted the director in late 2017. “… I don’t know where you came from or what we did to deserve such an honor to do life with you.”
By 2018, they were attending workouts together and moved into a swanky new office with valet parking in downtown Jackson. Together, they cooked up idea after idea. A statewide self-help lecture program. A program for inner-city youth. A feeding program. Something called “Jesse gym.”
If DiBiase could take the concepts he created during his time with the welfare program and make them unique, the two men hoped they could go into business together and sell the product to other states.
“I set (sic) up at night dreaming shit. But remember for us dreams are reality cause with Gods help all things are possible,” Davis once texted DiBiase. The texts were heavy with talk of faith and prayer.
Davis testified that he planned to leave the agency at the end of 2018 and part of his efforts with DiBiase were so there would be something waiting for him in retirement. They even mused about purchasing a property – the “DaViase Farm.”
“You’re talking about generational security?” the prosecutor asked, and Davis confirmed.
The prosecution asked if Davis’ newfound ventures with Teddy DiBiase made his brother jealous. “Yes sir, there was always some tension there,” Davis said.
The discussions weren’t always about grand visions. Sometimes they were about more tangible desires. Davis testified that the day after Teddy DiBiase received a $1 million agreement in May of 2018, the wrestler bought a truck. “That truck looks good with you on it,” Davis texted.
“I LOOOOOOOOVE THIS THING,” DiBiase responded. “And I love you John Davis more.”
But all while Davis was ensuring Teddy DiBiase in text messages of future grant funding “that will provide you with a level of security that I promised you,” he at times sang a different tune with the nonprofit directors.
“It bothers me that I allowed these guys to gain access and it feels like they are using,” Davis texted the Families First nonprofit directors. He was referring to DiBiase and friends of the wrestler that Davis had also allowed to the welfare trough.
In another text, Davis wrote, “It’s frustrating how these people think they are so talented they need big money and then don’t do anything.”
At one point, Davis said he surmised that the nonprofit directors were hesitant about cutting off funding for DiBiase’s friend, who was not performing under his contract, because they thought doing so would upset Davis. The director wanted to assure them he was on the side of accountability.
“There are no sacred cows for me,” Davis texted.
“But there were two sacred cows, weren’t there?” Meynardie asked Davis Friday.
Davis replied: “There were.”