A United States district court judge in Virginia last week certified the case of a Roanoke Rapids man charged with catalytic converter theft as complex and has allowed his trial to be scheduled outside the deadlines prescribed by the Speedy Trial Act.

“The court thus grants the joint motion and certifies the case as complex … due to the volume of discovery and the parties' joint stipulation, as doing so serves the ends of justice,” District Judge David J. Novak wrote in his order.

The federal government and the defense attorney for Theodore Nicholas Papouloglou filed a joint motion last week for the court to declare the case as complex and set the trial outside the speedy trial deadline.

Papouloglou, who was federally indicted in the case, last month pleaded not guilty to the four-count indictment lodged against him.

The joint motion argued that the Papouloglou matter is a complex case for the following reasons:

The defendant is charged in a four-count indictment alleging the defendant engaged in a multifaceted criminal scheme that spanned at least two years; involved tax evasion related to income from catalytic converter sales, conspiracy to commit offenses related to stolen catalytic converters, and the operation of an unlicensed money transmission business related to catalytic converters; spanned multiple states; included the participation of numerous co-conspirators; and involved over $15 million in financial transactions.

The motion noted that the discovery in this case is voluminous and consists of financial and accounting records, text messages, emails, videos, Facebook communications, law enforcement reports, and business records from numerous entities.

 The discovery consists of more than 125 gigabytes of electronically stored information. That 125 gb figure includes at least 245,508 discrete documents, which in the aggregate consist of more than 138,000 pages.

The next scheduled proceeding in the case is an on-the-record status conference for August 19 before Novak.