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That internal memo from the General Auditor about the gift tickets is ultra bad enough. But it’s just the tip of her ultra unethical iceberg.
Diaz — who has both gypsy con artist liar Vanessa Brito and disgraced absentee ballot bagman Al Lorenzo working for her campaign — is also the subject of a Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics and Public Trust investigation into allegations that she steered city business to her boyfriend, the equally ethically-challenged Ben Alvarez, who was found guilty of misconduct by the Florida Bar in 2009. He was ordered to complete ethics training and to reimburse $22,000 to another client and pay a $2,000 fine to them. Alvarez has a new complaint against him with the Florida Bar for using his position to harass and damage the family of his ex wife. Part of the allegations is that he forged documents. In 2012, his firm was sued by State Farm for fraud in a case where it was alleged that someone’s signature was forged — and a judge ruled for the plaintiff and ordered the law firm to reimburse more than $82,000 in fees and losses. In 2009, the Florida Bar ordered him to complete ethics training and to reimburse $22,000 to another client and pay a $2,000 fine to them.
Colleagues call Alvarez “the Tony Soprano of the legal world.”
And, to make it ultra worse, Diaz said she did nothing wrong.
“It is a violation if I give work to my husband or a family member, but we’re not married,” Diaz told Ladra, and shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly, as if that were a good enough reason.
So, let’s get this straight. She admits she was steering city work to Alvarez’s firm — but, hey, it’s okay, they’re not married. “We just live together,” she said, with that straight-faced smile she always has that makes her look like the cat that ate the canary.
The Commission on Ethics might not think it’s okay. Their investigation is not yet complete, but when it becomes a public record, we’ll see testimony from another attorney who was hired for a complicated (read: expensive) title transfer deal at the city. This lawyer is bonded and insured for title work, and Alvarez is not. This lawyer told Ladra, and the Ethics Commission investigator, that after she was paid by the city, she had to write Alvarez a check from her personal account. For the same amount. On the same day.
Isn’t that illegal? Wouldn’t that be money laundering or third party racketeering or something? There should be a law against that because it stinks to high heaven.
Especially since many sources tell Ladra that Alvarez is the one pushing the very young Colombiana — who only worked in one law firm before her city job, and that was her husband’s — to leave her $95,000-a-year city job and run for judge. Two sources have forwarded me an email he wrote to colleagues and friends (and clients, perhaps?) urging them to contribute to her campaign. Las malas lenguas say he is trying to replace his old puppet on the bench, former judge Ana Maria Pando, who was disgraced and defeated after the Judicial Qualifying Commission reprimanded her for illegal loans to a previous campaign. She was also being investigated for writing letters on behalf of litigants before her on her judicial office letterhead when she was voted off the bench.
Guess where Pando works now? She’s one of the newest associates at Alvarez, Carbonell, Feltman & Da Silva.
Diaz said she had always wanted to be a judge and that it was offensive and ridiculous to think she was Ben’s marionette.
“Of course he’s supporting me. He’s my boyfriend. We’ve lived together for four years,” Diaz told Ladra. “But Ben Alvarez isn’t the one going to all these events every day — five, six, seven, eight times a day, every day — to campaign. That’s Veronica Diaz and her family who is doing that.”
But it is still kinda ultra scary to think that Ben’s ultra iffy law firm wants an ultra puppet judge on the bench.
And doesn’t all this make Renier Diaz de la Portilla seem almost like a dream candidate?
Just like his brothers before him, Baby DLP has real accomplishments in his track record that the media often conveniently forgets.
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For judge: Renier DLP vs Veronica D = promise vs. puppet added by Ladra on
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