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Raleigh, Wake County

Raleigh: Wake grand jury indicts Jason Saine and David Coble

Freeman told WRAL and The News & Observer on Thursday that a Wake County grand jury returned felony indictments. The counts against Jason Saine and David Coble are accusations, not convictions.

UpdatedThis story has changed since it was first published.

By Alexandru Stanciu · Published

Downtown Raleigh buildings under a blue sky

File photo: James Willamor (CC BY-SA 3.0), via Wikimedia Commons.

What we know

Confirmed

  • WRAL's page, by Will Doran, has article:published_time 2026-11-12T13:57:49Z and article:modified_time 2026-11-12T23:24:45Z. Those instants are 8:57 a.m. and 6:24 p.m. Eastern on Nov. 12, 2026. The visible clock on the page reads 1:57:49 p.m. and 11:24:45 p.m., which matches the UTC figures. This file does not treat those labels as a second Eastern time. A read around 10 p.m. Eastern still showed the 6:24 p.m. modified time.Confirmed by WRAL page, read Nov. 12, 2026
  • Freeman told WRAL on Thursday that a Wake County grand jury indicted Jason Saine on embezzlement and obtaining property by false pretense. WRAL calls him a Lincoln County Republican and a former top state budget writer who resigned from the legislature in 2024. That page does not print an age, and it does not use the town name Lincolnton.Confirmed by Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman, as reported by WRAL
  • WRAL says David Coble was indicted on those same charges, and that Saine also faces an additional charge of aiding and abetting Coble. That additional-count wording is WRAL's. The News & Observer, Carolina Journal, and WBTV do not describe the paperwork that way.Confirmed by WRAL only
  • Saine's written statement to WRAL says he did not commit any crime and that he looks forward to clearing his name.Confirmed by Jason Saine, as reported by WRAL
  • Freeman told WRAL the investigation is still going. Her words in that interview: "This is the beginning of this process." She also said, "This investigation is still ongoing." Those two lines are not in the other three accounts used here.Confirmed by Lorrin Freeman, as reported by WRAL only
  • The News & Observer story by Dan Kane displays an update time of Nov. 12, 2026, 8:52 p.m., and says it was originally published that day at 8:58 a.m. This desk did not retrieve machine-readable timestamps for that page, so those clocks are not converted here.Confirmed by The News & Observer page, read Nov. 12, 2026
  • Freeman told the Observer on Thursday that a Wake County grand jury returned felony indictments against Saine and against the director of the Mooresville nonprofit Greater Carolina.Confirmed by Lorrin Freeman, as reported by The News & Observer
  • The Observer identifies Saine as 53, a Lincolnton Republican, and a former chief budget writer. It says he was appointed to the North Carolina House in 2011, served until 2024, and resigned in August of that year. The age, the town of Lincolnton, the 2011 appointment, and the August resignation are in this Observer account. WRAL does not print them.Confirmed by The News & Observer only
  • The Observer identifies Coble as 49, a former Mooresville town commissioner, and Greater Carolina's treasurer. It also says income-tax filings list him as the nonprofit's director. The age 49 and the director line on the tax filings are in this Observer account.Confirmed by The News & Observer
  • The Observer's count list, attributed to Freeman: Saine and Coble each face two counts of obtaining property by false pretenses and two counts of embezzlement of more than $100,000. Coble also faces one count of embezzlement of less than $100,000. Freeman said Saine aided and abetted Coble rather than obtaining the money himself.Confirmed by Lorrin Freeman, as reported by The News & Observer
  • The Observer also quotes indictment language that uses the words obtaining and attempting to obtain goods and services, including food, beverages, athletic-event tickets, and lodging, in an amount over $100,000, to be paid by Greater Carolina's donors. That quotation is kept separate from Freeman's aiding-and-abetting summary. This file does not reprint the rest of the charging language.Confirmed by Indictment language, as quoted by The News & Observer only
  • Freeman told the Observer the charges grow out of Greater Carolina credit-card expenses that had nothing to do with the nonprofit's mission. The paper describes that mission as promoting economic development through conservative ideas. This file does not list vendors, trips, or purchases from search warrants.Confirmed by Lorrin Freeman, as reported by The News & Observer
  • The Observer says Greater Carolina came under investigation after a second bourbon tour in the Louisville, Kentucky, area in April 2024, and that the nonprofit took Saine and other lawmakers on bourbon trips in 2022 and 2024. That page, in the text read here, does not name the State Bureau of Investigation in that account.Confirmed by The News & Observer only
  • Freeman told the Observer that Coble and Saine are scheduled to appear in court on the charges on Dec. 7. WRAL, Carolina Journal, and WBTV do not print that date in the pages read here.Confirmed by Lorrin Freeman, as reported by The News & Observer only
  • The Observer said Coble could not be immediately reached.Confirmed by The News & Observer only
  • Carolina Journal's live headline is "Saine, Greater Carolina director indicted on multiple charges." The web address still ends in report-saine-expects-to-be-indicted-today. article:published_time is 2026-11-12T13:17:57+00:00, which is 8:17 a.m. Eastern. article:modified_time is 2026-11-12T15:08:22+00:00, which is 10:08 a.m. Eastern. The visible byline reads CJ Staff. The page's author meta field reads Mitch Kokai.Confirmed by Carolina Journal page, read Nov. 12, 2026
  • Carolina Journal says documents released Thursday show a Wake County grand jury indicted Saine and Greater Carolina director David Coble. Citing court records, it lists two charges of obtaining property by false pretenses and two counts of embezzlement of more than $100,000 for Saine, and those four plus one count of embezzlement of less than $100,000 for Coble.Confirmed by Court records, as reported by Carolina Journal
  • On aiding and abetting, Carolina Journal does not give its own reading of the indictment. It quotes The News & Observer, citing Freeman, that Saine did not obtain the property and money but aided and abetted Coble, who did.Confirmed by Carolina Journal, citing The News & Observer and Lorrin Freeman
  • Carolina Journal says the State Bureau of Investigation has been looking into Greater Carolina since questions arose about a 2024 bourbon tour at a Kentucky distillery involving state legislators.Confirmed by Carolina Journal only
  • Carolina Journal prints a longer statement from Saine and says Business North Carolina, which first reported the indictment, received it. The sentence in which he says he did not commit any crime and looks forward to clearing his name is in that statement. This desk did not open the Business North Carolina page.Confirmed by Jason Saine, as carried by Carolina Journal from Business North Carolina
  • WBTV, by David Hodges, has article:published_time 2026-11-12T17:23:50.872Z and article:modified_time 2026-11-13T02:11:05.858Z. Those instants are 12:23 p.m. and 9:11 p.m. Eastern on Nov. 12. The page label 12:23 p.m. EST matches the published time.Confirmed by WBTV page, read Nov. 12, 2026
  • WBTV says a Wake County grand jury indicted the two men Thursday morning. Citing court records, it gives Saine four felony counts: two of obtaining property under false pretense and two of embezzlement over $100,000. It gives Coble those four plus one count of embezzlement under $100,000. It calls Coble a former Mooresville town commissioner and Greater Carolina's treasurer. It does not print either man's age.Confirmed by Wake County court records, as reported by WBTV
  • WBTV's account of the indictment says Saine is not accused of the embezzlement itself, but of aiding and abetting Coble. A statement the station said it received includes the line that he did not commit any crime and looks forward to clearing his name.Confirmed by Indictment, as summarized by WBTV; Jason Saine's statement to WBTV
  • WBTV said Coble directed questions to attorney Mark Jones, and that Jones had not responded by the time the story published. That is a different account from the Observer's line that Coble could not be reached.Confirmed by WBTV only
  • None of the four web stories read for this file printed a street or a house number. This file does not add one, and it does not itemize businesses named in search warrants.Confirmed by Comparison of WRAL, The News & Observer, Carolina Journal, and WBTV, read Nov. 12, 2026

Alleged or reported

  • Jason Saine committed two counts of obtaining property by false pretenses and two counts of embezzlement of more than $100,000, as someone who aided and abetted David Coble rather than as the person who took the money.Court-record counts as The News & Observer, Carolina Journal, and WBTV printed them, with Freeman's aiding-and-abetting account in the Observer and WBTV's indictment summary. WRAL instead calls aiding and abetting an additional charge. These are accusations. An indictment is not a conviction. Saine is presumed innocent unless proven guilty in court.
  • David Coble committed those same four counts plus one count of embezzlement of less than $100,000, tied to Greater Carolina credit-card expenses Freeman said were unrelated to the nonprofit's mission.The four-plus-one count list is in The News & Observer, Carolina Journal, and WBTV. The credit-card and mission wording is Freeman, via the Observer only. These are accusations. An indictment is not a conviction. Coble is presumed innocent unless proven guilty in court.

Still unknown

  • Whether WRAL's additional aiding-and-abetting charge is a fifth count, or the same theory the other three outlets describe. This file does not merge those accounts
  • A street or a house number. None of the four stories printed one, and this file does not
  • Coble's own statement. The Observer said he could not be reached. WBTV said he referred questions to Mark Jones, who had not answered. Those are not the same report
  • Whether the Dec. 7 court date will be kept. Only the Observer, quoting Freeman, printed it
  • Whether anyone else will be charged. Freeman told WRAL the investigation is still ongoing. No outcome is known
  • The Business North Carolina story Carolina Journal cites. This desk did not open it
  • A guilty verdict. Nothing in these four accounts is a conviction

What this means for you

Public safety
An indictment is an accusation. Jason Saine and David Coble are presumed innocent unless proven guilty in court. This story is not an official or emergency notice. If someone is in immediate danger, call 911.

Instructions from Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman, via WRAL and The News & Observer; court records, via Carolina Journal and WBTV

This site is not the Wake County District Attorney, the courts, or the State Bureau of Investigation. Questions about the case file go to the court. This is not an emergency service. If anyone is in danger, call 911.

What happened

In Raleigh, Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman said Thursday that a grand jury had returned felony indictments against former state Rep. Jason Saine and David Coble. Thursday was Nov. 12, 2026. An indictment is an accusation. It is not a guilty verdict.

Saine is the former House budget writer who left the legislature in 2024. Coble has been treasurer of Greater Carolina, the nonprofit at the center of the case. Four newsrooms published accounts the same day. They do not describe the charging papers the same way.

What WRAL reported

Will Doran's story went up at 8:57 a.m. Eastern and was modified at 6:24 p.m. Eastern. The clock printed on the page matches those instants in UTC. A read around 10 p.m. still showed the 6:24 p.m. stamp.

Freeman told the station the panel indicted Saine for embezzlement and for obtaining property by false pretense. The copy calls him a Lincoln County Republican and a former top budget writer. It gives 2024 as the year he resigned. It does not give an age, and it does not say Lincolnton.

WRAL puts Coble on the same charges, then adds a further count against Saine: aiding and abetting Coble. That extra-count wording belongs to this station. The other three pages do not use it.

Saine declined an interview and sent a statement. In it, he says he committed no crime and wants to clear his name.

Freeman also told WRAL the inquiry is not finished. "This is the beginning of this process," she said. In the same interview she said the investigation is still ongoing. The other three stories do not carry those two lines.

What The News & Observer reported

Dan Kane's story shows 8:58 a.m. as the first publication and 8:52 p.m. as the update. This desk did not get machine-readable times for that page, so those clocks stay as the page displayed them.

Freeman told the paper the indictments name both men. The Observer's biography of Saine is more specific than WRAL's: age 53, Lincolnton, a chief budget writer, appointed to the House in 2011, gone as of August 2024. Those details stay with this paper.

Coble, in the same account, is 49. He is a former Mooresville town commissioner and Greater Carolina's treasurer. Tax filings, the paper says, list him as director.

The count list Freeman gave the Observer is two false-pretense counts and two embezzlement counts above $100,000 for each man, plus one embezzlement count below $100,000 for Coble only. Her summary is that Saine aided and abetted Coble instead of taking the money himself.

The same story quotes charging language about obtaining goods and services, food and drink, tickets, and lodging, above $100,000, paid by the nonprofit's donors. That quotation is not the same sentence as the aiding-and-abetting summary. Both stay on the page. Neither is a conviction.

Freeman tied the case to Greater Carolina credit-card expenses that, she said, had nothing to do with the group's mission. The Observer describes that mission as promoting economic development through conservative ideas. Businesses named in search warrants are not listed here.

The paper traces the inquiry to a second bourbon tour, in the Louisville area, in April 2024, after earlier trips with lawmakers in 2022 and 2024. It does not, in the paragraphs read here, name the State Bureau of Investigation.

Freeman put both men on a court calendar for Dec. 7. The other three outlets do not print that date. The Observer said Coble could not be reached right away.

What Carolina Journal reported

The live headline says Saine and the Greater Carolina director were indicted. The web address still ends in a slug about expecting an indictment. The story was published at 8:17 a.m. Eastern and modified at 10:08 a.m. Eastern. The byline on the page reads CJ Staff. An author field in the page code reads Mitch Kokai.

The Journal says documents released Thursday show the grand jury acted against Saine and director David Coble. Court records, it writes, list two false-pretense charges and two embezzlement counts over $100,000 for Saine. Coble has those and one embezzlement count under $100,000.

It does not offer its own paraphrase of the aiding-and-abetting theory. It quotes the Observer, which quoted Freeman, for the line that Saine did not obtain the property and the money, and that Coble did.

The SBI enters in this account: the Journal says the bureau has been examining Greater Carolina since questions about a 2024 bourbon tour at a Kentucky distillery that included state legislators.

A longer statement from Saine is printed here and credited to Business North Carolina, which the Journal says had the news first. That statement includes the no-crime sentence. The Business North Carolina page was not opened for this file.

What WBTV reported

David Hodges's story was published at 12:23 p.m. Eastern and modified at 9:11 p.m. Eastern. The on-page label matches 12:23 p.m. EST.

The station says the grand jury acted Thursday morning. Court records, as WBTV lists them, give Saine four felonies: false pretenses twice, and embezzlement over $100,000 twice. Coble's list adds embezzlement under $100,000. The station calls him a former Mooresville commissioner and the nonprofit's treasurer. Ages are not in this copy.

WBTV's reading of the indictment is that Saine is not accused of the embezzlement itself. The accusation, it says, is aiding and abetting Coble. The statement sent to the station includes the same no-crime sentence WRAL and the Observer carried.

Coble, in this account, sent questions to attorney Mark Jones. Jones had not answered when the story published. That is not the Observer's "could not be reached" line, and the two are not combined here.

What this file leaves out

No home address appears here. None of the four stories printed one. Search-warrant spending is not itemized.

No one named in this story has been convicted on these counts. Saine and Coble are presumed innocent unless a court finds otherwise.

Triangle Local is not the district attorney's office, the courthouse, or the State Bureau of Investigation, and it is not an emergency service. If someone is in danger, call 911.

Related coverage

Other Wake County reporting is on the county page. Raleigh stories are on the city page. County decisions are collected in the government section. A separate file from the same evening covers a county hiring freeze: related file.

Photos

Text-only. No image from WRAL, The News & Observer, Carolina Journal, or WBTV is used. No booking photograph is used.

Why it matters

A Wake County grand jury indicted a former House budget writer and the treasurer of a nonprofit that took legislators on trips. The four newsrooms do not describe the counts the same way. Readers in Raleigh need that split, and they need the charges labeled as accusations.

Updates

  1. Nov 12, 2026, 10:06 PM

    First published. WRAL's additional aiding-and-abetting count stays separate from the four-count list in The News & Observer, Carolina Journal, and WBTV. No street address. No search-warrant merchant list. lead is false. Not TikTok. Text-only. No booking photo and no outlet photo.

Sources

  1. Former NC lawmaker indicted on embezzlement, other charges in Bourbon Trail probe (WRAL, Will Doran, article:published_time 2026-11-12T13:57:49Z / 8:57 a.m. Eastern Nov. 12, article:modified_time 2026-11-12T23:24:45Z / 6:24 p.m. Eastern. Visible page clock 1:57:49 p.m. and 11:24:45 p.m. matches UTC, not a second Eastern time. Freeman told WRAL on Thursday that a Wake County grand jury indicted Jason Saine, a Lincoln County Republican and former top budget writer who resigned in 2024, on embezzlement and obtaining property by false pretense. Coble indicted on the same charges. WRAL adds that Saine faces a further count of aiding and abetting Coble. Saine's statement says he did not commit any crime and looks forward to clearing his name. Freeman: "This is the beginning of this process" and "This investigation is still ongoing." No age, no Lincolnton, no Dec. 7 date, no SBI sentence. Text-only. No WRAL photo used.)

    Official sourcePublished by Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman, via WRAL · Checked Nov 12, 2026, 10:06 PM

  2. Former NC lawmaker charged in Greater Carolina bourbon trip case (The News & Observer, Dan Kane; page shows updated Nov. 12, 2026, 8:52 p.m., originally published 8:58 a.m. Machine-readable timestamps were not retrieved. Freeman said Thursday a Wake County grand jury returned felony indictments. Saine, 53, Lincolnton Republican, chief budget writer, House from 2011, resigned August 2024. Coble, 49, former Mooresville town commissioner, Greater Carolina treasurer, listed as director on tax filings. Each faces two counts of obtaining property by false pretenses and two counts of embezzlement of more than $100,000. Coble also faces embezzlement of less than $100,000. Freeman said Saine aided and abetted Coble rather than obtaining the money himself. A separate indictment quotation uses obtaining-goods language over $100,000. Credit-card expenses unrelated to the mission of promoting economic development through conservative ideas. Investigation after a second bourbon tour in the Louisville area in April 2024. Court date Dec. 7. Coble could not be immediately reached. Saine's statement includes the no-crime sentence. Does not name the SBI in the tour paragraph read here. Text-only. No Observer photo used.)

    Official sourcePublished by Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman, via The News & Observer · Checked Nov 12, 2026, 10:06 PM

  3. Saine, Greater Carolina director indicted on multiple charges (Carolina Journal; visible byline CJ Staff; author meta Mitch Kokai; article:published_time 2026-11-12T13:17:57+00:00 / 8:17 a.m. Eastern; article:modified_time 2026-11-12T15:08:22+00:00 / 10:08 a.m. Eastern. URL slug still says report-saine-expects-to-be-indicted-today. Documents released Thursday: Wake grand jury indicted Saine and director David Coble. Court records: Saine faces two false-pretense charges and two embezzlement counts over $100,000; Coble faces those four plus embezzlement under $100,000. Aiding-and-abetting sentence is quoted from The News & Observer citing Freeman, not offered as the Journal's own indictment reading. SBI inquiry since questions about a 2024 Kentucky distillery tour involving state legislators. Longer Saine statement attributed to Business North Carolina, which this desk did not open. No ages, no Dec. 7 date. Text-only. The Carolina Journal photo is not used.)

    Official sourcePublished by Wake County court records, via Carolina Journal · Checked Nov 12, 2026, 10:06 PM

  4. Former NC lawmaker and former Mooresville commissioner face embezzlement charges (WBTV, David Hodges, article:published_time 2026-11-12T17:23:50.872Z / 12:23 p.m. Eastern Nov. 12, article:modified_time 2026-11-13T02:11:05.858Z / 9:11 p.m. Eastern Nov. 12. Grand jury in Wake County Thursday morning. Court records: Saine, four felonies, two obtaining property under false pretense and two embezzlement over $100,000; Coble, those four plus embezzlement under $100,000. Former Mooresville commissioner and Greater Carolina treasurer. No ages. Indictment summary: Saine is not accused of the embezzlement but of aiding and abetting Coble. Statement includes the no-crime sentence. Coble directed questions to attorney Mark Jones, who had not responded. Search-warrant merchant names are not repeated here. No street address. Text-only. No WBTV photo used.)

    Official sourcePublished by Wake County court records, via WBTV · Checked Nov 12, 2026, 10:06 PM

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