Coming in from Hamilton, Ohio, Jim spent his first two years in 6th Squadron then to the other end of Vandenburg Hall with the 18th Squadron. While academics were not his passion, Jim did well and able to do well as a member of the Lacrosse Team when it became a varsity sport our Second Class Year. After graduation, it was Pilot training at Reese AFB, Texas then to Phan Rang AB, Vietnam flying C-123 missions in support of forward operating bases. After Vietnam, Jim was assigned to the 912th Air Refueling Squadron at Robins AFB, Georgia flying the KC-135. After completing transition training in the KC-135 and 14 months at Robins, Jim was back in the SEA conflict, eventually flying two TDYs as a member of the 307th Air Refueling Squadron at Utapao AB, Thailand and one with the 909th Air Refueling Squadron at Kadena AB, Okinawa, Japan. In early 1972, Jim and Sherry were married in Oxford, Ohio. Later that year while he was at Kadena AB, his first son Damian was born. In 1973, Jim completed his Air Force commitment, and decided that he should try something that would keep him closer to the old terra-firma. So together they embarked on amazing life experiences for the next 35 years in both the private and public sectors.
          His first three years back in the civilian world, Jim was a labor contract negotiator as Manager of the Central Kentucky Chapter of the National Electrical Contractor's Association, in Lexington, Kentucky where his second son Adrian was born. Then in 1976, Jim became a Special Agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and was initially assigned to the Detroit, Michigan office and later to FBI Headquarters in Washington DC. While in Detroit, Jim worked primarily on the Organized Crime Squad investigating the first successful prosecutions for Sports Bribery in the Southern District of Michigan, and earned his MBA in Labor Relations from Wayne State University.
           In 1984 he was transferred to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where he was the supervisor of twenty Special Agents covering Southwestern PA and Northern West Virginia. One of the investigations he supervised involved surreptitious drug purchases by undercover officers in a drug task force investigation that resulted in the arrest and conviction of over fifty defendants. Many of those defendants were Jamaican Nationals who came to the upper Shenandoah Valley around Martinsburg, WV purportedly as migrant fruit pickers.
          After ten years in Pittsburgh, Jim and Sherry were off to London, United Kingdom (UK) where for the next three years, Jim was the Assistant Legal Attaché until he retired from the FBI in 1997. As the Asst. Legal Attache Jim worked closely with the Scotland Yard Fraud Squad and Special Branch, The Serious Fraud Office, and MI-6. He coordinated several investigations with Agents in L.A., New York, Miami and Washington, D.C. of Russian Organized Crime figures laundering funds through banks in England and the Channel Islands to the U.S.
          Returning to the States, Jim and Sherry resettled in Albuquerque, New Mexico where Jim served for over a year as the Executive Director for the Central New Mexico Chapter of the National Electrical Contractors Association. However, in 2000 he decided to be altruistic and returned to school to receive a BA in secondary education. After 4 months teaching 9th grade Math and Science in an inner city Phoenix school, he decided that before he reverted to some of his former FBI training in dealing with high school freshmen, he had better switch fields again. So in 2002 the DeFazio's relocated to Charlotte, North Carolina where Jim was hired as a Senior Investigator for Wachovia National Bank's anti-money laundering unit. There he worked closely with Federal law enforcement agencies including some of his old compadres in the FBI within the provisions of the new PATRIOT Act. He stayed with Wachovia for six years until a change in management and overall philosophy prompted him to retire for good. During their 11 years in Charlotte, Jim and Sherry saw their son Adrian marry his high school sweetheart, Heather Linder and his son Damian finish a ten year stint in the Navy and marry Rachel Wilson form Memphis, TN.They now have five grand children, three with son Adrian in Fort Collins, CO and two with Damian in Wilmington, NC, ranging in age from 1 to 10. After spending two months in the summer of 2012 in Fort Collins to escape the hot humid NC weather, they decided to move there permanently. They are currently living in an one bedroom townhouse while their new home is being built. Now that they are in the same city with their son Adrian and his family, grandma will be able to spoil three of their grand kids rotten. They plan on making frequent trips back to North Carolina to visit the beach and be with their oldest son Damian and his family.