Mike Harmon faces more charges over Jennifer Jo Cobb dispute

Mike Harmon

Nationwide Series driver Mike Harmon and former Jennifer Jo Cobb business partner David Novak face additional charges of breaking and entering and larceny after a May 28 search found two racecars and five trucks on Harmon’s property.

The items were returned to Cobb, who is in a legal dispute with Novak over the ownership of the racing equipment.

The warrants for the arrests of Harmon and Novak were issued Sunday. Harmon turned himself in Monday after 5 p.m. and was booked and released on $10,000 bond.

Harmon and Novak already have a July 3 probable cause hearing over charges stemming from a race hauler taken — and still not found — from Cobb’s shop May 11.

In addition to the racing equipment, items seized in the May 28 search included $100 cash plus racing tools, clothing, merchandise and parts, according to the arrest warrants released Monday.

Jennifer Jo Cobb

The cars and trucks, returned to Cobb, did not have transmissions, engines nor a fuel cell in them. The value of the vehicles and other items seized is $125,000, according to the arrest warrants released Monday.

Novak and Cobb, who were once romantically involved while he supported her racing career, never entered into a business agreement, and now that they no longer are involved with each other — they broke up professionally and personally in late 2012 — they are in a legal dispute in U.S. District Court in North Carolina over who owns the race equipment and how $237,618 from the race team was spent. The legal disputes first surfaced when Cobb reported her race team hauler stolen prior to the May 17 race at Charlotte.

Novak claims in his lawsuit that he spent more than $1 million on Cobb’s race team. A judge in February denied Novak’s request that he have control of the equipment and funds until it could be determined who is the rightful owner. The ruling was based on that if he is the rightful owner, he could be compensated by a final judgment requiring Cobb to reimburse him.

Harmon, speaking to reporters the day after his initial May 15 arrest, said that he had nothing to do with the theft of the hauler, although an affidavit for an earlier search warrant indicates he told a detective he knew where the hauler was.

“The truth has got to come out (on who stole it)," Harmon said. “It’s not me." Sporting News