By: Lydia Crawley
The Parsons Advocate
A Tucker County Grand Jury on February 10th returned a superseding indictment charged of Driving Under the Influence for Trenton DiBartolomeo. The charge will be added to the 10 count indictment, bringing the total number of charges against DiBartolomeo to 11 with nine felonies and two misdemeanors.
DiBartolomeo appeared before Judge Steven Shaffer on Monday, March 9th in Tucker County Circuit Court to be arraigned on the superseding indictment charge. He was brought from the Tygart Valley Regional Jail where he has been being held without bond on the other 10 counts of his initial October 2025 indictment. Representing DiBartolomeo at the hearing were his attorneys Phil Isner and Jeremy Cooper. Tucker County Savannah Hull Wilkins was present for the prosecution.
In total DiBartolomeo faces the following Grand Jury Charges: Count One: Burglary, a felony; Count Two: Conspiracy, a felony; Count Three: Interfering with Emergency Communications, a misdemeanor; Count Four: Kidnapping, a felony; Count Five: Conspiracy, a felony; Count Six: Strangulation, a felony; Count Seven: Strangulation, a felony; Count Eight, Strangulation, a felony; Count Nine: Strangulation, a felony; Count 10: Strangulation, a felony and Count 11: Driving Under the Influence, a misdemeanor.
DiBartolomeo waived a reading of the charges during the proceedings. His attorneys requested the court reconsider the matter of bond, a request that was denied.
Wilkins said that she believes that Isner intends to employ a witness to the matter of diminished capacity due to intoxication. While there was nothing yet submitted to either the prosecution or the court on the matter, Wilkins requested that the court grant her an independent expert on the matter of diminished capacity.
Wilkins had an appointment with an expert set for April 1, but feared that she may not be able to have relevant paperwork and evaluations back in time for the start of the April 13th trial. Judge Shaffer offered to make a call to an independent expert to see if the court could procure an appointment sooner. The court was able to get DiBartolomeo an appointment the middle of March, which would allow for time to receive and process the evaluation prior to the start of the trial in April.
Wilkins said she also expected the defense to file a motion to suppress the statements and recordings in the case. There is also anticipated a motion by the defense to recuse the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, though motions in either matter have not been filed, Wilkins said.
The matter of jury pool size was also tackled during the hearing. Due to the case being a multi-defendant case involving four defendants and a small county, plus the prevalence of social media, it was argued and agreed that a large jury pool would need to convened for the DiBartolomeo trial. Judge Shaffer said that he would request a jury pool of 95 be convened.
The DiBartolomeo trial, which is scheduled to begin April 13th, is expected to last four to five days, with the possibility of running into Saturday of that week.
A motions hearing has been scheduled for March 19th in Preston County in the case.
