Fmr Davie Manager Tom Willi Faces More Gun Charges In The Keys
BY BUDDY NEVINS
Former Davie Administrator Tom Willi may be busted on federal gun charges a second time.
Thomas “Tom” Willi
Willi, 51, and his business partner Jarvis Osorio, 35, were arrested in July for illegally selling guns on Big Pine Key. Prosecutors charge the two men conducted an elaborate scheme that allowed unauthorized people to buy guns.
The two men are being held without bond after violating a condition for their release late last year. The $50,000 bond was revoked after allegedly buying a machine gun and sending it to a post office box, where Willi’s girlfriend allegedly tried to pick it up.
Federal prosecutors now say conversations Willi had in his jail cell could result in further charges, according to media reports in The Keys.
Willi was Davie Town Administrator in 2003-2004,. He was a familiar face to commissioners who appointed him, since he won the job after running a department in the West Broward Town Hall.
He left Davie top job after about a year to become the Monroe County Administrator in Key West.
Shortly after his Monroe County job ended – a Keys newspaper called his three-year tenure “controversial” because of the turbulent politics surrounding him – he decided to stay in The Keys and change careers.
He eventually opened a gun shop and shooting range with Osorio. It was in this shop that prosecutors say Willi conducted a ruse, illegally hiding who actually bought firearms. He is accused of hiring non-felons to fill out the federally-required paperwork for the real purchasers — felons.
After Willi left Davie, Town Commissioners made another hire which proved to be questionable – Chris Kovanes.
Christopher “Chris” Kovanes (Source: Florida Department of Corrections)
Kovanes spent the next year looting the town of thousand of dollars. He set up shell corporations and then submitted phony receipts for Davie to pay, using much of the money on a mistress.
Currently serving 12 years in a state prison on numerous theft and fraud charges, Kovanes is due to be released in 2019.
An April 4 trial date has been set for Willi and Osorio, but the new charges and various defense motions may cause delays.
January 21st, 2016 at 12:44 pm
Never been there. Know I know not to. Dumb hillbillies from West Virginia obviously congregated in Davie. It is disappointing to see Minroe County (the Keys) still havent gotten their act together (there is a chance their protective low rise zoning in Key West is being chipped away by politically correct multiculture bullshit) n county Zoning is as questionably correct as the days…when out right bribes got you Goodies.
January 21st, 2016 at 9:32 pm
Count, I’ll keep this comment factual. Several zipcodes in Davie have amongst the highest incomes and property values in Broward County. The Town of Davie’s finances and current Town Manager have won national awards.
I am sure we do have residents who hail from the great state of West Virginia and from the other 49 states (or other 55 if you use Obama’s geographic expertise) and from most of Latin America.
Perhaps you should widen your circle of knowledge and take a car, bus, or Uber ride out of your comfort zone and explore what Davie has to offer.
As for the two crooked past Town administrators from 10 years ago, Davie is not unique in having had bad apples. What local municipality has not?
January 22nd, 2016 at 2:23 pm
Count – I am surprised to see an asinine statement like “Dumb hillbillies from West Virginia obviously congregated in Davie” come from someone who considers himself an intellectual.
I suspect that the fine folks in Davie will have no problem with you staying away from their town.
PS – Nice response WestDavieResident
January 22nd, 2016 at 4:46 pm
WestDavieResident excellent response to Count’s ridiculous diatribe. Only one thing, why cheapen your stellar response by taking a swipe at Obama, who has nothing to do with this article whatsoever? It really cheapened your otherwise good work.
January 24th, 2016 at 8:50 am
@#4 Point well taken. I withdraw my comment about the President. I was just trying to add a bit of levity.
January 24th, 2016 at 10:23 am
The County Commission is a sewer that rips off the coastal cities that generate the resort taxes that the HILLBILLIES from the Mid-West rural South Brooklyn n the Bronx v
Because the barefoot shirtless morons of the great Outback. Davie has killed any chance of either NOVA or the Ft Lauderdale Museum of Art ever amounting to anything.
Monroe County is wise to defer to Key West interests Miami-Dade is wise to defer to Miami Beach interests n Palm Beach County to Palm Beach and lesser towns like Delray Beach n Boca Raton for tourism n culture. Broward commits cultural suicide by have Davie Sunrise Weston involved in these issues. I have never stepped foot in these places as THERE IS NO THERE THERE only a wasteland of crude vulgarity.