Frank “Pupie” Raia, the Hoboken politico and real estate developer who federal prosecutors have accused of overseeing a cash-for-votes scheme in the 2013 municipal election, lost a bid to have his case severed from his alleged co-conspirator.

Raia’s lawyer, Alan L. Zegas, told the judge overseeing his case that he would be denied a fair trial if he were forced to face charges alongside Dio Braxton, who is accused of promising Hoboken residents $50 per vote at Raia’s direction. Both men have denied the charges.

But U.S. District Judge William J. Martini denied the request in an order released on Monday. Martini’s ruling on the severance request was part of a host of rulings he made on motions filed by Raia, Braxton and federal prosecutors who charged the two men.

Martini also set a date of June 11 as the start of the trial, which will be closely watched by Hoboken political observers.

The charges facing Raia jolted Hoboken, where it’s long been an open secret that local political machines paid for votes using mail-in ballots. Prosecutors allege Raia ran one of these operations by directing his allies to promise voters $50 in exchange for applying for and casting mail-in ballots in 2013. That year, Raia, a Democrat, was an at-large council candidate in the city’s nonpartisan municipal race and supported a voter referendum that would have weakened rent-control laws. He and the referendum lost.

Zegas argued to Martini that Braxton told a grand jury “no payments were made to any person in exchange for their vote” and that people paid by the campaign were campaign workers. If Braxton declines to testify during the joint trial, Zegas argued to Martini, Raia “will be deprived of Braxton’s exonerating testimony.”

“The government’s decision to join the defendants in one indictment, knowing that co-defendant Braxton exonerated defendant in his statements to law enforcement and the grand jury, directly violates the right of defendant to a fair trial,” Zegas argued in his motion.

Martini reserved judgment on the admissibility of alleged co-conspirators’ statements.

Raia is one of four people charged in this federal probe. One, Lizaida Camis, has pleaded guilty.

Terrence T. McDonald may be reached at tmcdonald@jjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @terrencemcd. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.