ORLANDO, Fla. — Joe Ellicott — once a close friend and employee of former Seminole County Tax Collector Joel Greenberg and before that a sports radio host with a loud on-air swagger — sat in a federal courtroom Wednesday and in a quiet voice pleaded guilty to his role in a bribery scheme.
In a hearing that lasted about 35 minutes, Ellicott described himself as a middle man.
“I am guilty, sir,” he said, adding later, “I was the go-between between two individuals. ... I assisted in a kickback with two individuals.”
As part of his plea agreement with federal prosecutors, Ellicott, 43, also admitted to illegally selling more than $5,000 worth of Adderall — an amphetamine used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder — to a buyer for over a four years through his business Uncle Joe’s Coins, Currency and Collectibles in Maitland.
“I sold part of my prescription,” Ellicott said, adding that the drug deals happened between 2016 and 2019 in Orlando.
Ellicott, 43, is slated to face sentencing within the next 75 days.
Magistrate Judge David Baker at Wednesday’s hearing said Ellicott can be free from custody until his sentencing. The judge also gave Ellicott permission to move to North Carolina, where he plans to live in an area near Asheville, according to courtroom discussions.
Ellicott must remain either in western North Carolina or within Central Florida. He also must surrender his U.S. passport and undergo periodic mental health evaluations and drug testing.
Ellicott last month became the latest of Greenberg’s associates to be charged by federal prosecutors after Keith Ingersoll and James Adamczyk were indicted last November for defrauding a local investor out of more than $12 million in a real estate scheme.
The two felonies each carry a maximum prison sentence of 20 years and fines totaling more than $5.2 million.
Federal prosecutors, however, said in the plea agreement that they will recommend a reduced sentence for Ellicott if he cooperates in other investigations. Authorities have not said publicly if those other investigations involve additional Greenberg associates.
When Baker pressed Ellicott further on details of the bribery scheme, Ellicott quietly spoke with his two attorneys for a couple of minutes.
“I don’t want to speculate,” Ellicott then told the judge.
But major media outlets, including CNN and NBC News, have reported that a grand jury had been meeting in Orlando to consider charges against Republican U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, who was friends with Greenberg.
Ellicott served as a groomsman at Greenberg’s wedding in 2016. And shortly after Greenberg took office in January 2017, Ellicott was hired to serve as the office’s “supervisor of facilities” or “special projects manager” — although several current and former employees told the Orlando Sentinel they never saw him in the Tax Collector’s office.
Greenberg is in the Orange County Jail awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty last May to six felony charges, including sex trafficking of a child, identity theft, stalking, wire fraud, creating a fake driver’s license and conspiracy to bribe a public official.
Greenberg’s sentencing date is March 29. However, his attorney has asked that it be continued, and the federal judge has agreed to hear the matter privately.
Ellicott in his plea agreement admits that he acted as a middleman between an unnamed company’s owner and a “public official” in coordinating illegal bribes and kickbacks between January 2017 and some time in 2019.
Greenberg is not named in the plea agreement. But the description of the public official, the time frame and other details closely match the former tax collector.
In one instance, the company’s owner withdrew $6,000 cash from a local bank and then called Ellicott for him to pick up the money and deliver it to the public official that night, according to the plea agreement.
Ellicott knew that the money was a bribe in exchange for the public official to use that company for work in the public office at inflated prices at taxpayers’ expense, according to the plea agreement.
When Baker asked Ellicott in court if knew that the money transfer was going to be used as an illegal kickback, Ellicott answered, “Yes, sir.”
Ellicott is among several friends and associates that Greenberg hired to work in the Tax Collector’s Office or awarded contracts soon after he was sworn into office in January 2017.
Ingersoll of Orlando was paid $48,000 by Greenberg to work as a real estate adviser and seek out property deals on behalf of the public office.
At the time, Greenberg wanted to open a new branch office in Winter Springs. Ingersoll and Adamczyk then became involved in a property-flipping deal with Greenberg and the Tax Collector’s Office that a county audit later called “possible fraudulent activity.”
In that deal, Adamczyk paid $680,000 for a former bank building on State Road 434 in Winter Springs that was identified by Ingersoll. Greenberg and the Tax Collector’s Office then purchased it hours later for $810,000 in public cash.
———
