Jonesborough ‘preservation’-oriented contractor indicted for abandoning jobs, theft

JONESBOROUGH, Tenn. (WJHL) — Marc Kovac seemed like the perfect guy to do historic renovation work in Tennessee’s oldest town — at least on paper.

A member of Jonesborough’s Historic Zoning Commission, recommended by one of the town’s most committed historic preservationists, a carpenter skilled (supposedly) in preservation with an all-female crew to boot.

Now Kovac faces several civil complaints and, as of Tuesday, three felony theft counts for abandoning contracted jobs and theft. Two of those theft counts are for “$60,000 or more but less than $250,000,” which is a class B felony carrying 8 to 30 years in prison.

According to a couple of people who say Kovac and his company MEK Historical Restoration left them with incomplete, badly performed work, there was no substance behind the talk.

“He was recommended by someone, a historic renovation person, and yes, he had a golden tongue,” said Marat Moore, who with her husband hired Kovac to help them fulfill a retirement dream: renovating a farmhouse originally built in 1849.

“We wanted to bring this back to life,” Moore said, walking around the unfinished interior of the home on Spring Street about a half-mile from downtown Jonesborough. “We knew this was an important piece of history in Jonesborough. There was a cooper who lived here who made barrels, and he had his industry here.”

By the time Moore realized Kovac wasn’t delivering as advertised, she was out a lot of money. She said he’d ask for additional payment for things and she’d oblige.

“He robbed my retirement, that’s all I’ll say,” Moore said.

That was after Kovac had given her what she said were three reasons to bring him on.

“He was recommended by someone I respect. He had an all-woman crew and since I had worked in nontraditional work earlier in my life, that appealed to me. And he lived right in the middle of historic Jonesborough and I could not imagine anyone in the middle of town who would do this. My mistake.”

‘I knew I wasn’t alone. And we organized’

Moore said she felt devastated as the reality sunk in (she listed about 80 problems with Kovac’s work).

“The worst hit of my life. I blamed myself. I thought I was alone.”

She wasn’t. She learned several people were in the same boat, including Burgin Dossett III and his wife, Laura White-Dossett.

“When I learned that … a whole group of people had been damaged, although I was sorry for them it was a happy day for me because I knew I wasn’t alone. And we organized.”

Dossett and White-Dossett are glad they did, and they shared a similar story of someone who seemed impressive on paper and had somehow developed a great reputation in a town that takes historic preservation very seriously.

“A lot of people thought that he was legitimate and was a contractor and had a lot of familiarity with historic structures,” said Dossett, who is renovating a 204-year-old house right on Main Street that was last occupied by his grandmother’s antique shop and stood empty for 50 years.

Several people signed their names to a letter to the Attorney General, and eventually, a Jonesborough Police Department Investigator took on the case. It turns out Kovac had also fallen short as a subcontractor on a job restoring the post office at the Mountain Home VA.

“We realized the extent of the damage that he had caused, not just in Jonesborough, where the criminal case was set, but in the county and at the VA,” Moore said.

“We knew that simply removing him from his position at the historic zoning board would not be enough. We wanted to stop him from harming others. We care about our neighbors in Jonesborough, but beyond that, I care about what happens to other people.”

Moore even remembers going to a family she knew who was on the verge of hiring Kovac and convincing them not to do it. Along with that came a lot of work cooperating with the authorities.

“I had to provide many photos. We all provided significant reports to the Jonesborough Police Department and to the attorney general.”

Moore said she didn’t lack material, including a kitchen addition where he took the wall down to the dirt with no foundation.

“He cut blind[ly] into the attic for new attic access without checking, cut the new electrical line, the new HVAC line and the branch duct, hit it, and did not inform us. That could have caused a fire. Built on rotten beams. Some studs he left the rotten beam and simply faced it off, so the stud wasn’t holding up anything or providing support.”

“That is just three out of, I think there were 80 problems in this house.”

White-Dossett said Kovac had “a lot of big, interesting ideas. It seemed pretty exciting to us.”

But aside from the word-of-mouth reputation and the position on historic zoning, verifiable past work included just “one house in Jonesborough where he had done the kitchen cabinets, he had done the millwork and the carpentry,” Dossett said. “He had done a good job and we saw photos of that.”

So the couple paid. They paid advances. They paid when he said “Things like ‘I need an HVAC system’ and ‘it’s going to cost a tremendous number of dollars’, and that ‘money went to Disney World’ or somewhere,” White-Dossett said.

She said she took note when a very experienced plasterer who was set to do their work was tossed aside by Kovac in favor of an almost completely inexperienced crew.

Dossett said the couple’s loss is enough to “say we’re playing in the major leagues.” They’re getting the home finished so they can move from Nashville to be closer to their grown children, but White-Dossett said the final product won’t be the same.

‘He deceived all the way up the line’

“He was so good as a con man that he deceived all the way up the line,” said Moore, who at this point isn’t sure she’ll ever have enough funds to complete the work. “Of our group, two people hired him because he was on the board (Kovac has since been removed).”

Moore said a feeling that Kovac, who faces a number of civil suits as well but has not been convicted of any wrongdoing, would continue to seek and get jobs was one reason the group pursued a criminal investigation.

“We decided to try to stop him from harming others,” she said.

In a Feb. 5 letter to the Tennessee Attorney General’s Division of Consumer Affairs, Moore wrote that the group had met with Jonesborough investigators starting in December 2023.

“My goal is that no other innocent homeowner suffer as we have as a result of the fraud of Mr. Kovac.”

A grand jury returned a presentment, similar to an indictment, on March 11. Kovac is charged with three counts of willful abandonment of a home improvement project, with a theft of property count included in each. The smaller is for theft of more than $10,000 and less than $60,000.

“The lead investigator was so good, so responsive, so thorough,” Moore said. “He presented the facts of the case to the grand jury and I’m extremely grateful to him.”

She said she’s relieved Kovac has been arrested but wouldn’t say whether she thought he deserved jail time.

“That’s not my decision to make. I think he is an extremely gifted con man. I trust that the system will make that decision.”

Moore, who turned 70 this year, said she’s learned a hard lesson.

“I would like to warn other people in our area that there are these kinds of people operating; and you need to be more careful than I was, less trusting than I was, because otherwise you can sustain significant damage.”

Kovac has a hearing in his criminal case scheduled for July 1. He posted a $25,000 bond within a few hours of his arrest on Thursday and was released from custody.

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