THE $7.98 CRIME SPREE: CORY CODDINGTON AND THE WORST SATURDAY EVER COMMITTED TO PAPER
Opinion / Commentary
I have waited fifteen years to write this column. Fifteen years of watching this family strut around Deerfield Beach like they own the deed to it. Fifteen years of the threats, the bullying, and the bottomless self-regard. And now, the State of Florida has done me the enormous favor of writing the first draft for me—under penalty of perjury, in a public court filing.
So let’s go through it. Slowly. Savoring every single link in the chain.
The Tree Won (And the Concrete Lost)
Saturday, June 6, just before noon. According to the State’s Motion for Pre-Trial Detention—a real public record filed June 10 in case 26006788CF10A in front of Judge Frank Ledee—Cory Joseph Coddington, 46, crashed his vehicle at 565 East Hillsboro Boulevard. Cory didn’t just hit the foliage; he barreled through it with enough momentum to yank a palm tree clean out of the dirt and rip a 3-foot-by-10-foot concrete pillar right off the building. Photos from the scene show a black Cadillac Escalade wrapped around the scenery like it owed the landscaping money. The tree, for the record, is doing fine. The tree is the only party in this story with its dignity intact.
Now here’s the part that should make your blood boil. Per the State’s motion, a woman—a complete stranger named Shyann Figaro—pulled over and got out of her car to make sure he was breathing. That’s it. She saw a wrecked SUV, assumed she was dealing with a human being, and did the decent thing. In Deerfield Beach, that is apparently a punishable offense.
His response, per sworn testimony? He climbed into HER car, told her to “stay the fuck back,” and drove off in it. He left a good Samaritan standing on Hillsboro Boulevard, watching her own tail lights disappear with a Coddington behind the wheel.
First-degree felony carjacking. Strike one against the only person on that street who gave a damn whether he lived or died. Frame that. Put it on the family Christmas card.
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But we’re just warming up, because at 12:00 p.m. sharp, our criminal mastermind arrived at the Daily’s at 5 North Federal Highway for a victory lap. The State’s motion is beautifully precise about the sheer petty scale of this heist:
He grabbed a White Claw ($4.99), cracked it open, and pounded it on the spot.
He grabbed a Frozen Banana Chocolate ($2.99) and ate it.
He strolled past every point of sale, walking out at 12:04 p.m. having robbed the store of exactly SEVEN DOLLARS AND NINETY-EIGHT CENTS.
Four minutes. A hard seltzer and a banana pop. The man allegedly carjacked a getaway vehicle just to commit the laziest, lowest-stakes convenience store theft in Broward County history. Somewhere, actual criminals are embarrassed for him.
And because Cory’s appetite for destruction apparently requires a side of trans fats, witnesses over at the neighboring Chick-fil-A reported that he also wandered over, jumped the curb in the stolen car while covered in blood, walked up to a literal child, and stole a single French fry before demanding a milkshake. You cannot write fiction this absurd. He carjacked a woman, robbed a clerk of eight bucks, and bullied a toddler for a potato. Tony Montana is weeping in his grave.
The Grand Finale: This Is Not Rugby
Deputies arrived. Now, this is the easy part. A toddler can do this part: sit down, shut up, and put your hands behind your back. Instead, Cory decided to fight armed law enforcement with a flurry of kicks, strikes, and “bracing”—which is cop shorthand for thrashing around like a maniac so they can’t cuff you.
Then—and I need you to really sit with this—the State’s motion transcends the genre and becomes literature. He announced, “I HAVE A BOMB,” yelled at the sergeant, “I’ll grab your dick,” and lunged straight for the man’s crotch.
He missed. He missed, and according to the State Attorney’s Office, he ended up jamming his finger into the sergeant’s backside instead.
Read that again. The State Attorney’s Office typed that sentence, looked at it, and filed it into public record. Forty-six years old. Threatened to grab a cop’s junk, whiffed it, and accidentally finger-banged a sergeant. Put that on the tombstone. I am left asking the Broward Sheriff’s Office: where is the body cam? Where is the proctology cam? This isn’t rugby, guys. How does one even face-plant into a manual digital rectal exam in a gas station parking lot?
Still not done. Mid-brawl, he screamed, “Give me your gun,” and put his hand on the deputy’s holster. When you swing on deputies, announce a bomb, go for a loaded sidearm, and stick a digit where digits have no business going, law enforcement is legally allowed to subdue you. With enthusiasm. That’s not brutality; that’s physics.
When they finally got the cuffs on him and searched his pockets? A large bag of methamphetamine right there in the front left pocket. Of course there was.
Because no Coddington production ends on time, we get an encore. They loaded what was left of him into fire rescue, where a medic was literally trying to patch up his arm. Cory repaid that kindness by leaning over and headbutting him.
Two people tried to help Cory Coddington on June 6. He carjacked the first and headbutted the second. That is the whole man, beautifully summarized in a single Saturday afternoon.
The decision-making here reflects a man who has never once, in his entire gilded life, believed that consequences applied to him. And why would he? Look at the stock he comes from.
His father, Ron Coddington, has spent decades as Deerfield Beach’s self-appointed expert on everything. Let’s take a quick trip down memory lane to when Ron was running for Commissioner and came in a distant 5th out of 4 people. There was an incident in his neighborhood—cops and EMTs everywhere. A heavily intoxicated Ron interjected himself right into the fray—because after all, he’s Ron Coddington. It took multiple firefighters just to talk basic damn sense into him. Drunk, loud, and entirely unhelpful.
The arrogance in that bloodline could power the streetlights on Hillsboro. This is the same family ethics dynamic we’ve tolerated for years. This is the same guy who used to sit behind the safety of a Facebook lockdown group screen, spewing vile, anonymous garbage because he thought he was completely untouchable. Well, guess what, buddy? Payback is here. And who knew payback involved a digital intrusion into a sergeant’s uniform?
The apple didn’t just fall close to the tree; it hit the trunk at highway speed and left the engine block in the produce aisle.
The Receipt
The bill is now officially due. Cory is currently on probation, has a prior domestic battery conviction, and sits under an active domestic violence injunction out of Palm Beach—which he already stomped all over in March by sneaking onto a Royal Caribbean cruise ship with the protected person. The state gave him a temporary pass, a legal mulligan, and he rewarded the system by face-planting into a multi-felony disaster three months later.
The State is asking Judge Ledee to hold him with NO BOND until trial. Under Florida Law 907.041, if the court finds a substantial probability that he committed the carjacking, locking him up isn’t a suggestion—it’s mandatory.
Carjacking cases in Broward take a year or two to get to trial. Cory is about to move into the Main Jail in Fort Lauderdale for the foreseeable future. New cellmate, new menu, new social circle. I’m personally tempted to send five bucks down to the commissary to buy him some ramen noodles and maybe a bottle of personal lubricant on behalf of the town.
Because he gets to walk into general population as the 46-year-old who tried to grab a deputy’s balls and missed so badly he violated a supervisor. That story walks into the facility with him; the whole population will know before his bunk is even made.
I am told by his defense team’s filings that Cory is currently sitting in the ICU with a tracheotomy tube, heavily sedated. I genuinely hope he is having some very funky dreams. But let’s be entirely clear: nobody made him hit that tree, terrorize a bystander, steal a White Claw, swipe a kid’s fry, scream about a bomb, or assault a paramedic. He forged every single link in this chaotic chain with his own two hands.
When the cell door slams shut, let’s not pretend it’s a tragedy. It’s just the receipt. Karma doesn’t carjack you. You carjack yourself.
Legal Notice: All charges are allegations drawn from public filings; the defendant is presumed innocent unless proven guilty in a court of law. Sources: State’s Motion for Pre-Trial Detention (Filed 6/10/2026), State v. Coddington, Broward Case No. 26006788CF10A; Broward County Clerk of Courts Docket; BSO Public Information Release (6/6/2026); NBC 6 South Florida Report (6/6/2026).
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Chaz Stevens is a First Amendment practitioner based in Deerfield Beach, Florida. His work has produced legislative rewrites, policy reversals, and one governor who had to put his own name on the reason he changed his own law. He drafts civil litigation pleadings for licensed attorneys at Sufficient to Show, engineers public records work product for law firms at the same practice, and is the founder of REVOLT Training.
Great article! Now every time I hear mention of Deerfield Beach I am going to think about these Coddingtons. 😳😂
People, don't be like Steve... It's not a good look.