Contractor spared prison in Upland graft scheme
MEDIA COURTHOUSE » The former owner of an Eddystone security system company who paid kickbacks to former Upland Borough Council President Ed Mitchell in exchange for securing no-bid contracts at borough properties was sentenced to 23 months of intermediate punishment Thursday.
Thomas Patrick Willard, 62, the former owner of Logan Technology Solutions, was also given
90 days on electronic home monitoring and seven years of consecutive probation, and ordered to pay
$45,762 in restitution to the borough of Upland.
“The reason I’m sentencing you as such is not that I countenance what you did by any means,” Common Pleas Court Judge John Capuzzi said. “What I did take into consideration is your amenability to rehabilitation, the fact that you cooperated fully with the commonwealth (and) the fact that you brought this to light, to allow the Borough of Upland to purge itself of a cancer.”
Mitchell, 75, of Fourth Street, a Republican, served on council for
17 years, including eight as president until he was replaced by Christine Peterson in 2016.
He was convicted at trial in July on six counts each of theft by deception and restricted activities, 12 counts of criminal conspiracy and 18 counts of bribery, but was acquitted on two charges of intercept communications. Sentencing for Mitchell is set for today.
Willard entered an open guilty plea to all 82 felony counts against him in July, which included six counts each of theft by unlawful taking, receiving stolen property, theft by deception, theft by failure to make required dispensation of funds and restricted activities seeking improper influence.
Willard also pleaded to 18 counts of bribery, two counts of intercept communications and 32 counts of conspiracy. Many of the charges merged for the purposes of sentencing.
“I’ve been disgraced, I lost my business – not that that makes a difference – but I sincerely apologize for what the court had to go through for all this,” Willard said Thursday.
Willard was arrested and charged along with Mitchell in December 2016 for a long-running scheme in which Mitchell would enter no-bid contracts with Willard’s company to provide equipment to the borough at inflated prices.
“He would make sure that the jobs would go through properly,” said Willard at Mitchell’s trial earlier this year. “We worked out a deal where I would cash the checks and he would get some money from each check from the jobs.”
Willard also testified that he and Mitchell would break work for the same job into smaller invoices so that it would not trigger a bid requirement. The checks were typically cashed at a checkcashing business instead of being deposited into business accounts.
In exchange for securing the work, Willard said he would provide Mitchell with a “thank you” in the form of cash payments, typically 10 to 15 percent of the invoice, but sometimes as high as
20 percent.
“He would say, ‘I’m getting you the work, I would think that you would try and acknowledge that I’m doing this for you,’” Willard said at trial.
Willard had also received a
$30,300 payment for police dashboard cameras – broken up into two $15,150 invoices – which he said he never ordered. Willard said he and Mitchell concocted a story that the equipment had been stolen and that Willard should rebill the borough for more than $15,000 in replacement parts. The restitution order was for those payments.
In addition to the kickback scheme, Mitchell was accused of secretly recording fellow council members and others using covert cameras and microphones Willard placed in the secretary’s office and council chambers, allegedly at Mitchell’s direction.
Willard’s attorney, Timothy Possenti, noted Willard had been cooperative from the outset of the investigation, testifying at a preliminary hearing even before having any agreement in place with the District Attorney’s Office.
That was backed up by Delaware County Detective Timothy Deery, who described Willard Thursday as “a horrible businessman” but with some redeemable qualities.
Deery, who had been subpoenaed to appear by Possenti, said he spoke with Willard for about
45 minutes at his home in August
2016 and laid out the case. Willard immediately provided company records and a computer, then engaged in a days-long process of going through records to help investigators put the case together, according to Deery.
Deery said Willard never ducked his calls or dodged tough questions, and agreed to conduct a phone intercept with Mitchell.
Eddystone attorney Konstantinos Mikropoulos and Eddystone VFW Commander Bill Daws also spoke on Willard’s behalf.
Assistant District Attorney Mary Mann had provided the court with sentencing guidelines but could not make any statements at sentencing due to the nature of Willard’s plea.