Ex Hialeah cop challenges mayor’s lackey, Pablito Hernandez

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Former Hialeah Police Det. Ricky Garcia, a longtime critic of Mayor Carlos “Castro” Hernandez and the Seguro Que Yes Council, has decided who he is going to challenge for a seat on the city dais: Councilman Paul “Pablitiquito” Hernandez, who was first appointed to the seat by the mayor.

Garcia had expressed his intent to run months ago, but had not decided where. He was hoping that Councilwoman Vivan Casals-Munoz would challenge the mayor, which many are apparently encouraging her to do, so he could run in an open seat. But Ladra guesses this move means Garcia has either heard that she is definitely not going to jump or decided that Hernandez was vulnerable enough.

“I decided to run against Pablito because he has done nothing for this city,” Garcia told me. “And because he works for a lobbying firm, he has had to abstain or recuse himself 40 times from voting. That is not in the best interest of the residents here.”

In fact, Garcia added, Hernandez — who works for Hialeah lobbyist Felix Lasarte — sponsored his first ordinance at the very last Hialeah city meeting: A measure to support a law in the legislature about emergency transportation services for assisted living facilities, which he said had touched him because of a family member affected by the very issue. Garcia immediately criticized that.

“He said he did it because of an incident with a relative,” Garcia told El Nuevo Herald earlier this month. “But the work of a council member should be constant, not only when there is an election campaign.”

Hernandez, who had been appointed to the Hialeah Housing Authority by former Mayor Julio Robaina, was appointed to the council by Castro Hernandez in 2011 to replace his own seat after he replaced Robaina, who was running for county mayor and lost. Even Councilwoman Lourdes Lozano, before she won in 2011, had criticized the selection of the city’s lobbyist’s employee (she really wanted it to be her, though). And many said then that the seat would be filled temporarily by someone who was not going to run for it later on.

But Hernandez did run. And he beat Frank Lago, former chief of staff to Sweetwater Mayor Manny Marono, with almost 59 percent of the vote.

Garcia, who retired last May after 28 years with the force, supported former Mayor Raul Martinez in his failed bid to unseat Hernandez in 2011. But he said he has not been in touch with Martinez since and has not gotten support for his campaign. He’s also been heavily involved for years in investigating the absentee ballot fraud in the City of Retrogress, having worked with Ladra and former Police Chief Rolando Bolanos on that in 2011. He was with our group when he caught Castro’s favorite boletera, Emelina Llanes, collecting ballots in a public housing building during that election, on videotape, and driving around in the mayor’s wife’s car to do it.

Knowledge of those shady operations could help him, since Hernandez — like the rest of Castro’s lackeys — has traditionally benefitted from the absentee ballot drives in Hialeah, which are mostly concentrated in public housing and assisted living facilities or group homes where the voters don’t even remember their own names, let alone who they are voting for.