Ex-Chamberlain Player Back In Spotlight After Arrest

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Prayer Answered As Stolen Money Found

TAMPA - Three years ago, news reports described how Chamberlain High School wide receiver Cody Overby ended his senior season limping off the field with a sore knee, a taped ankle and a shoulder that had popped out of joint.

   Cody Overby

Today, Overby is in the news for a different reason: Hillsborough County deputies arrested him Tuesday in the strong-arm robbery of $13,000 from a prison minister outside a Carrollwood bank.

Deputies recovered about $11,000 of the money inside a men's room trash can at a Subway sandwich shop less than two blocks from the bank where Joanne Gavlick, 54, was robbed Monday.

How the money ended up there wasn't clear. But a police report indicates that Overby and two other men came looking for it later and confronted people at the restaurant about where it went. Investigators today are searching for the two other men.

Overby, who turns 21 next week, is charged with felony grand theft and felony strong-arm robbery. He was held at Orient Road Jail today on $9,500 bail. Jail records state he is self-employed as a referee.

"Until they show us he's guilty, we prefer to think he's innocent," his stepmother, Susan Larkin, said by phone this morning. She declined further comment.

Overby has been arrested but not prosecuted on misdemeanor charges including disorderly conduct, Florida Department of Law Enforcement records show.

His attorney, Brian Gonzalez, who is a friend of his family, called the felony arrests "very out of character for this young man."

Gonzalez also questioned why about $2,000 of the stolen money is missing. "All I know is that it wouldn't make any sense to me that all of the money wouldn't have been found," he said.

Gavlick, a prison minister who has been disabled since 1999 because of a back injury, was mugged at a Bank of America branch at 14002 N. Dale Mabry Highway on Monday after she arrived to deposit cash withdrawn from her pension. She said she planned to stay at the beach a week writing a spirituality book, then move to an apartment in Mango.

Gavlick said she was en route to a sheriff's office substation today to collect her money from investigators, who offered to escort her to the bank.

Overby was recognized by several people shortly after the robbery, about 2:20 p.m. Monday, an arrest affidavit says. Reached by phone today, none of the witnesses wanted to comment.

A 23-year-old man told investigators he was inside the Subway, 4351 N. Dale Mabry Highway, when Overby offered him $100 for a ride out of the area, the affidavit states. The man said he recognized Overby.

A short time later, two men entered the Subway, "asking for a large amount of U.S. currency that had been left in the restroom garbage can," the affidavit states. Two Subway customers, one a 16-year-old boy, told deputies the men "got angry" with them because "they were taking too long" in the bathroom, the affidavit states.

About 6:10 p.m., a Subway employee found the money in the bathroom trash can and called the sheriff's office, the affidavit states. He could not be reached for comment.

Meantime, the men looking for the cash followed the 16-year-old to a GrillSmith restaurant nearby, where they confronted him again and demanded he and the other diners "give back the property they found in the restroom," the affidavit states.

A 20-year-old GrillSmith employee described the confrontation to detectives and said she also recognized Overby from high school, the affidavit states. She could not be reached for comment.

Tuesday, detectives obtained surveillance video from the Bank of America branch and were able to identify Overby. His stepmother viewed the video, too, and confirmed his identity, the affidavit states.