Almost three years after his arrest, the victims of a formerly prominent Eatonton businessman’s theft have finally received financial restitution.
Jimmy “Jim” Franklin Willis pled guilty in Superior Court last week to four counts of executing fictitious checks, three counts of theft by conversion, and 29 counts of theft by taking, according to court records.
Ocmulgee Judicial Circuit Chief Judge Alison T. Burleson sentenced Willis to 20 years of probation, gave him credit for his time already spent in jail, and ordered him to pay back all of the money he had pled guilty to stealing. Willis paid back the entire amount immediately, according to District Attorney T. Wright Barksdale and Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills.
Barksdale acknowledged that any victim of theft of such a large amount of money would prefer the perpetrator spend time behind bars. He said Willis had no criminal history and theft is a non-violent offense, so if he were sent to prison in today’s overcrowded prison system, he’d probably be let out in one year or less.
“So, we focused on trying to get all of the money back to the victims,” Barksdale said. “That was our primary focus, getting the best outcome for the victims. And we did that. And he got 20 years' probation, which is [like] a life sentence being monitored by a probation officer.
“I am satisfied with the outcome — not happy with it, but satisfied,” Barksdale said. “And I’m proud of the great job Assistant District Attorneys Allison Mauldin and Carter Harwell did because it was a very tedious process to get the outcome that we got.”
Willis was arrested Oct. 21, 2022, on various racketeering and fraud charges stemming from a reported pattern of stealing from the local Veterans of Foreign Wars Post #6686 and from the Putnam County Veterans Wall of Honor Park.
When he received a phone call from the sheriff, Willis turned himself in without incident. He was later released on property bonds.
In addition to being a longtime insurance agent in Eatonton, Willis was also well-known as a veterans advocate and former commander of the VFW post, as well as a co-founder of the Veterans Wall Park. At the time of his arrest, he was also the State Commander of the Department of Georgia Veterans of Foreign Wars.
In the spring before his arrest, leaders with the VFW filed formal complaints at the sheriff’s office, which led to the investigation and subsequent arrest. The pending trial was delayed when Willis’s defense attorney, William H.Smith III, filed requests for his client to undergo mental evaluations by the Georgia Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities to determine his competency to stand trial, and then a different evaluation to determine the degree of criminal responsibility and sanity at the time of the thefts.
Court records also reveal several court dates had to be rescheduled due to conflicts in Smith’s schedule.
“Everybody thinks something might have been going on with this, but it wasn’t. It just took that long because of the evaluations,” Sills said.
As required by special conditions of his sentence and probation, Willis immediately paid $25,274.74 to the VFW Post 6686; $4,020 to the Veterans Wall of Honor Park in Eatonton; and $2,400 to a private business, according to Sills and court records.
“He had already paid $8,600 from the time I opened the investigation until I arrested him because he knew what was coming,” Sills said. “So he went and got money from somewhere and paid that then, but all the rest was paid at the time he was sentenced.”