"Helping the homeless", Miami-style.
https://www.local10.com/news/2019/11/19/miami-dade-county-closing-down-homeless-camp-while-promoting-awareness-week/
Miami-Dade County closing down homeless camp while promoting awareness week
Homeless camp on stretch of 37th Avenue being shut by county
MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – A group of people living in a Miami homeless camp is being told to leave.
This is happening in the middle of Homeless Awareness Week.
Some of those people built shelter out of whatever they could find.
Others are living in their cars, and some in makeshift trailers.
The homeless camp is located on a stretch of Northwest 37th Avenue in Miami.
It's now so large that the county is deeming it a sanitary nuisance and a safety issue, sending cease and desist notices to dozens who call the street home.
The order comes into effect as the county is promoting its hunger and homelessness awareness week, asking the public to be more considerate of residents without roofs over their heads.
Homeless advocate and Pastor Frank Diaz says most of the men living at the camp are registered sex offenders who have virtually nowhere to go.
"Everyone considers this a hot potato," Diaz said.
According to Diaz, unless the mayor and county officials can help these people find a permanent place to live, they’re not just going to go away.
"For the last six months, I’ve been trying to sit down with the mayor, but apparently he’s very busy," Diaz said.
Showing posts with label Lauren Book Child Safety Ordinance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lauren Book Child Safety Ordinance. Show all posts
Thursday, November 21, 2019
Friday, November 15, 2019
Lauren Book's legacy in Miami-Dade continues as homeless registrants are forced to move again
Here we go again. Lauren Book hasn't lived in Miami-Dade County for years but the Hitler-esque bill named in her "honor" continues to be an international embarrassment. Now, I recognize that some readers don't care about folks on the sex offense registry, but it is a proven fact that lack of housing promotes crime. This means the Books are putting your families at risk for their personal quest for vengeance.
Just think about how much time, energy, and taxpayer dollars go towards all of this harassment.
Just think about how much time, energy, and taxpayer dollars go towards all of this harassment.
Friday, April 27, 2018
Berlin had the Brown Shirts; Miami has the Green Shirts
Are you aware that Miami has been one of the meanest cities in America for years? Are you aware that Miami has actually tried to overturn a law protecting the homeless from status-based arrests at least as far back as 2013?
If anyone has doubts that Ron Book is bullying the homeless, look at the parallel story on the Green Shirts harassing and destroying the property of homeless Miamians.
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/miami-dade-sex-offenders-face-arrest-with-closure-of-encampment-on-may-6-10299920
Updated: Miami-Dade Will Close Sex Offender Camp by May 6, Threatens Jail Time for Stragglers
JESSICA LIPSCOMB | APRIL 27, 2018 | 8:00AM
In December, after New Times published its latest story chronicling the squalid conditions of the camp and its effect on local business owners, Miami-Dade's Public Safety and Health Committee took action. With a vote of 3-1, commissioners on the committee voted to amend an outdoor camping ordinance in a way that would effectively shut down the camp. The rest of the county commission passed the item in January, and Mayor Carlos Gimenez in March issued a memo giving the homeless residents 45 days to vacate.
With the May 6 deadline quickly approaching, outreach groups have been working with the sex offenders to find new places to live. But thanks to stringent local laws governing where sex offenders can live, many homeless advocates worry they have few alternatives to their camp near the intersection of NW 71st Street and 36th Court. According to the mayor's letter, Miami-Dade Police officers have the option to "remove" those who stay, a clause that refers to a local law permitting police to arrest those who trespass on county property.
"The message being given to the people living there is if you're there on May 7, that you'll be subject to arrest," says Jeffrey Hearne, an attorney with Legal Services who has represented residents of the camp.
As many as 300 sex offenders have a registered address at or near the encampment, according to state records. Under a 2005 county law ordinance named for Lauren Book, a Florida senator and survivor of child sex abuse, offenders who abused victims under the age of 16 must live 2,500 feet from any school, much farther than the 1,000 feet required under state law.
A 2017 report commissioned by the ACLU found that across the county, only 320 affordable rental units met those guidelines.
Since August, the Homeless Trust, its chairman Ron Book (Lauren's father), and the Housing Assistance Network of Dade have been distributing information about rental assistance to the homeless offenders who live at the camp. But other homeless advocates say the assistance is no good if the offenders can't find a landlord who will rent them a home.
"Many people there would love to accept that rental assistance, but they have not been able to find the housing which would permit them to accept it," the ACLU's Jeanne Baker told commissioners in December.
As the deadline looms, it remains unclear what will become of the people who stay behind at the camp. Frank Diaz, a pastor who works with the homeless residents, says probation officers are encouraging some offenders to move near the Krome Service Processing Center at the edge of the Everglades.
"They have been told starting May 6, whoever remains is gonna be taken away, have all their possessions thrown away, and possibly be arrested," Diaz says.
The Miami-Dade Police Department has not yet answered New Times' questions about what will happen after the deadline.
Update: Detective Alvaro Zabaleta, a spokesman for Miami-Dade Police, says the department’s sexual predator unit is aware of the memorandum and is monitoring the situation to determine a plan of action come May 6.
“We’re hoping everyone gets placed and everything works itself out between the county and them,” he says. “The memo says we are the last resort. We want to make sure that is the case.”
No formal directive has been issued yet because it’s still unclear if or how many offenders will remain at the camp after the deadline.
“The last thing we want is to have to take any enforcement,” Zabaleta says. “It just depends how everything lays out between now and May 6. It’s hard for us to have a plan of action if we don’t know how things are going to go.”
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/video-shows-miami-green-shirts-destroying-homeless-property-violating-pottinger-agreement-10292474
Video Shows City Workers Destroying Property of Homeless Miamians
TARPLEY HITT | APRIL 25, 2018 | 8:31AM
The morning of April 17, Wilbur Cauley left all of his belongings in their usual place: stacked by a fence under the I-395 overpass at NW First Court and 13th Street. It was in the middle of a four-block area where about 30 homeless Miamians live. That morning, Cauley, an Army veteran in his late 50s who served three years in Germany, went to a nearby store for a soda. When he returned, he says, a man in a dark-green shirt was kicking bags that contained Cauley's birth certificate, driver's license, clothes, bedding, and even the food he keeps on hand to avoid diabetic shock.
"I said, 'Hey, what are you doing?' and I tried to get my stuff," Cauley recalls. "But the guy wouldn't let me get anything. He grabbed my arm and then he took all my stuff... They threw it all away. They took everything I have."
Cauley's version of events is supported by photos, video footage, and testimony from a half-dozen eyewitnesses, including Benji Waxman, a Miami lawyer and volunteer at the American Civil Liberties Union, and David Peery, a local activist who has experienced homelessness himself. Waxman and Peery have been involved in homelessness advocacy in Miami for years, and they say tensions between the city and locals have spiked in recent months.
Cauley’s antagonist was a member of the Miami Homeless Assistance Program, a group also known as "green shirts” because of their signature forest-green uniforms. The program, staffed partially by former homeless men and women, is tasked with providing aid and services to the area's homeless population. Over the years, the green shirts have been both praised for their hard work and criticized for harassing and even stealing from the very people they are supposed to help.
Now, Peery and Waxman say, they are at it again — conducting biweekly "cleanups" of areas where homeless people congregate, damaging property, and throwing away people's belongings. Waxman says the green shirts, police officers, and workers from several other city departments have mounted an aggressive campaign across Miami to chase homeless people out of the areas where they live. According to Cauley, the city has been “cleaning up” the First Court area twice a week for almost six months — acting in what Waxman and Peery claim is a direct violation of the famous South Florida federal court decision Pottinger v. City of Miami.
The historic class-action lawsuit was filed in 1988 by a group of 6,000 homeless people against the City of Miami. The plaintiffs, then led by a man named Michael Pottinger, and now by Peery, argued the city had criminalized homelessness by prosecuting people for misdemeanors they could not avoid committing — such as sleeping, bathing, or building a fire for warmth. “You cannot make a person an outlaw just because they don’t have a home,” Peery says.
When the case was settled a decade later, the judge set in place certain agreements between the City of Miami and the homeless population. Homeless individuals are now protected under the Pottinger agreement from being arrested for performing necessary, life-sustaining activities in public. Instead, the city must offer shelter and services before evacuating certain areas.
The decision includes another key stipulation: City officials may not seize or damage the belongings of homeless people unless they pose an obvious threat to public health. But Cauley, Waxman, and Peery say that’s exactly what the green shirts were doing April 17.
The city has a different story. “All property and people are treated with dignity and respect,” says Eugene Ramirez, director of communications for the City of Miami. “If our outreach staff finds any documents in clean-up areas, they collect them and bring them to the office for safekeeping. They leave a notice where the property is found so people can come collect their items.”
Ron Book, who runs the Miami-Dade Homeless Trust, says the county is working with the City of Miami to reduce homelessness. “Our goal is to be as aggressive as we can to encourage people to take housing,” Book says. “I am aware that there have been street cleanings to try to clear the streets.”
Many green shirts go to great lengths to ensure the well-being of their clients — Ramirez claims they collect items to protect them from damage during street cleaning. But Cauley responds that some of the outreach personnel go out of their way to harass the homeless community, such as conducting street cleanings at ungodly hours (as early as 3 a.m.), waking residents while they sleep, and forcing people out of public areas without offering another place to go.
“It’s total harassment,” he says. “Even if you’re sitting on the curb and nothing is behind you, they’ll say you’re blocking the sidewalk. You have to sit up against the fence like you’re in the military or something.”
So what exactly happened the morning of April 17? According to Waxman, six green shirts arrived in the area around 8:30 a.m. They came with several police officers, a handful of Neighborhood Enhancement Team members, and a parade of cleaning vehicles: a dump truck, a water pressure cleaner, three or four pickup trucks, and a street sweeper. The group stood around for a while, surveying the scene, and about an hour later, one of the green shirts announced the cleanup would begin.
"He walked up the middle of NW 1st Court and loudly ordered everyone to move their possessions immediately," Peery wrote in a complaint letter to the city. "When they walked up to Wilbur Cauley's possessions — bedding, clothes, a backpack and sheets that were stacked neatly against a fence — the large male Greenshirt shouted ‘Okay, now we're going to throw your shit away!’”
Peery filmed the incident on his phone. The video shows the green shirt moving Cauley’s possessions into a pile in the middle of the sidewalk and throwing other items on top. A woman on the sidewalk screams at the official and tells him to stop stealing her things. The man ignores her — he kicks and throws more stuff onto the pile. Only one person in the video is able to retrieve something from the pile. Others photos shows the same green shirt standing over and blocking Cauley’s stuff.
In all, Cauley lost every piece of identification he had, including his veteran bus card and his social security card. Losing your ID is always a nightmare, but it’s especially horrible if you’re homeless. Any shelter he might visit or any job he might apply for requires ID.
Peery says these regular cleanups are a less-than-subtle way of herding homeless people away from popular congregating spots.
“The campaign is working,” Peery says. “I went down to Lot 16 the other day, and no one was there.” Lot 16 is an area south of the Main Library and east of the Miami River, where some 50 or 60 homeless people used to live. After the city began conducting regular street cleanings, Peery says, everyone relocated. “And it’s happening here too. You see today, people have already left.”
The Pottinger settlement did leave in place a mediation clause — where plaintiffs can request meetings with the city over perceived violations of the agreement. Peery and Waxman requested a mediation, and one was scheduled for the morning of April 24. There is no report yet on the outcome.
“I’m hoping to convince the mediator of three things,” Peery says. “Number one, to tell the city to please stop. Number two, to compensate people for all the possessions they have lost. And number three, to please guarantee this won’t happen again.”
If anyone has doubts that Ron Book is bullying the homeless, look at the parallel story on the Green Shirts harassing and destroying the property of homeless Miamians.
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/miami-dade-sex-offenders-face-arrest-with-closure-of-encampment-on-may-6-10299920
Updated: Miami-Dade Will Close Sex Offender Camp by May 6, Threatens Jail Time for Stragglers
JESSICA LIPSCOMB | APRIL 27, 2018 | 8:00AM
In December, after New Times published its latest story chronicling the squalid conditions of the camp and its effect on local business owners, Miami-Dade's Public Safety and Health Committee took action. With a vote of 3-1, commissioners on the committee voted to amend an outdoor camping ordinance in a way that would effectively shut down the camp. The rest of the county commission passed the item in January, and Mayor Carlos Gimenez in March issued a memo giving the homeless residents 45 days to vacate.
With the May 6 deadline quickly approaching, outreach groups have been working with the sex offenders to find new places to live. But thanks to stringent local laws governing where sex offenders can live, many homeless advocates worry they have few alternatives to their camp near the intersection of NW 71st Street and 36th Court. According to the mayor's letter, Miami-Dade Police officers have the option to "remove" those who stay, a clause that refers to a local law permitting police to arrest those who trespass on county property.
"The message being given to the people living there is if you're there on May 7, that you'll be subject to arrest," says Jeffrey Hearne, an attorney with Legal Services who has represented residents of the camp.
As many as 300 sex offenders have a registered address at or near the encampment, according to state records. Under a 2005 county law ordinance named for Lauren Book, a Florida senator and survivor of child sex abuse, offenders who abused victims under the age of 16 must live 2,500 feet from any school, much farther than the 1,000 feet required under state law.
A 2017 report commissioned by the ACLU found that across the county, only 320 affordable rental units met those guidelines.
Since August, the Homeless Trust, its chairman Ron Book (Lauren's father), and the Housing Assistance Network of Dade have been distributing information about rental assistance to the homeless offenders who live at the camp. But other homeless advocates say the assistance is no good if the offenders can't find a landlord who will rent them a home.
"Many people there would love to accept that rental assistance, but they have not been able to find the housing which would permit them to accept it," the ACLU's Jeanne Baker told commissioners in December.
As the deadline looms, it remains unclear what will become of the people who stay behind at the camp. Frank Diaz, a pastor who works with the homeless residents, says probation officers are encouraging some offenders to move near the Krome Service Processing Center at the edge of the Everglades.
"They have been told starting May 6, whoever remains is gonna be taken away, have all their possessions thrown away, and possibly be arrested," Diaz says.
The Miami-Dade Police Department has not yet answered New Times' questions about what will happen after the deadline.
Update: Detective Alvaro Zabaleta, a spokesman for Miami-Dade Police, says the department’s sexual predator unit is aware of the memorandum and is monitoring the situation to determine a plan of action come May 6.
“We’re hoping everyone gets placed and everything works itself out between the county and them,” he says. “The memo says we are the last resort. We want to make sure that is the case.”
No formal directive has been issued yet because it’s still unclear if or how many offenders will remain at the camp after the deadline.
“The last thing we want is to have to take any enforcement,” Zabaleta says. “It just depends how everything lays out between now and May 6. It’s hard for us to have a plan of action if we don’t know how things are going to go.”
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/video-shows-miami-green-shirts-destroying-homeless-property-violating-pottinger-agreement-10292474
Video Shows City Workers Destroying Property of Homeless Miamians
TARPLEY HITT | APRIL 25, 2018 | 8:31AM
The morning of April 17, Wilbur Cauley left all of his belongings in their usual place: stacked by a fence under the I-395 overpass at NW First Court and 13th Street. It was in the middle of a four-block area where about 30 homeless Miamians live. That morning, Cauley, an Army veteran in his late 50s who served three years in Germany, went to a nearby store for a soda. When he returned, he says, a man in a dark-green shirt was kicking bags that contained Cauley's birth certificate, driver's license, clothes, bedding, and even the food he keeps on hand to avoid diabetic shock.
"I said, 'Hey, what are you doing?' and I tried to get my stuff," Cauley recalls. "But the guy wouldn't let me get anything. He grabbed my arm and then he took all my stuff... They threw it all away. They took everything I have."
Cauley's version of events is supported by photos, video footage, and testimony from a half-dozen eyewitnesses, including Benji Waxman, a Miami lawyer and volunteer at the American Civil Liberties Union, and David Peery, a local activist who has experienced homelessness himself. Waxman and Peery have been involved in homelessness advocacy in Miami for years, and they say tensions between the city and locals have spiked in recent months.
Cauley’s antagonist was a member of the Miami Homeless Assistance Program, a group also known as "green shirts” because of their signature forest-green uniforms. The program, staffed partially by former homeless men and women, is tasked with providing aid and services to the area's homeless population. Over the years, the green shirts have been both praised for their hard work and criticized for harassing and even stealing from the very people they are supposed to help.
Now, Peery and Waxman say, they are at it again — conducting biweekly "cleanups" of areas where homeless people congregate, damaging property, and throwing away people's belongings. Waxman says the green shirts, police officers, and workers from several other city departments have mounted an aggressive campaign across Miami to chase homeless people out of the areas where they live. According to Cauley, the city has been “cleaning up” the First Court area twice a week for almost six months — acting in what Waxman and Peery claim is a direct violation of the famous South Florida federal court decision Pottinger v. City of Miami.
The historic class-action lawsuit was filed in 1988 by a group of 6,000 homeless people against the City of Miami. The plaintiffs, then led by a man named Michael Pottinger, and now by Peery, argued the city had criminalized homelessness by prosecuting people for misdemeanors they could not avoid committing — such as sleeping, bathing, or building a fire for warmth. “You cannot make a person an outlaw just because they don’t have a home,” Peery says.
When the case was settled a decade later, the judge set in place certain agreements between the City of Miami and the homeless population. Homeless individuals are now protected under the Pottinger agreement from being arrested for performing necessary, life-sustaining activities in public. Instead, the city must offer shelter and services before evacuating certain areas.
The decision includes another key stipulation: City officials may not seize or damage the belongings of homeless people unless they pose an obvious threat to public health. But Cauley, Waxman, and Peery say that’s exactly what the green shirts were doing April 17.
The city has a different story. “All property and people are treated with dignity and respect,” says Eugene Ramirez, director of communications for the City of Miami. “If our outreach staff finds any documents in clean-up areas, they collect them and bring them to the office for safekeeping. They leave a notice where the property is found so people can come collect their items.”
Ron Book, who runs the Miami-Dade Homeless Trust, says the county is working with the City of Miami to reduce homelessness. “Our goal is to be as aggressive as we can to encourage people to take housing,” Book says. “I am aware that there have been street cleanings to try to clear the streets.”
Many green shirts go to great lengths to ensure the well-being of their clients — Ramirez claims they collect items to protect them from damage during street cleaning. But Cauley responds that some of the outreach personnel go out of their way to harass the homeless community, such as conducting street cleanings at ungodly hours (as early as 3 a.m.), waking residents while they sleep, and forcing people out of public areas without offering another place to go.
“It’s total harassment,” he says. “Even if you’re sitting on the curb and nothing is behind you, they’ll say you’re blocking the sidewalk. You have to sit up against the fence like you’re in the military or something.”
So what exactly happened the morning of April 17? According to Waxman, six green shirts arrived in the area around 8:30 a.m. They came with several police officers, a handful of Neighborhood Enhancement Team members, and a parade of cleaning vehicles: a dump truck, a water pressure cleaner, three or four pickup trucks, and a street sweeper. The group stood around for a while, surveying the scene, and about an hour later, one of the green shirts announced the cleanup would begin.
"He walked up the middle of NW 1st Court and loudly ordered everyone to move their possessions immediately," Peery wrote in a complaint letter to the city. "When they walked up to Wilbur Cauley's possessions — bedding, clothes, a backpack and sheets that were stacked neatly against a fence — the large male Greenshirt shouted ‘Okay, now we're going to throw your shit away!’”
Peery filmed the incident on his phone. The video shows the green shirt moving Cauley’s possessions into a pile in the middle of the sidewalk and throwing other items on top. A woman on the sidewalk screams at the official and tells him to stop stealing her things. The man ignores her — he kicks and throws more stuff onto the pile. Only one person in the video is able to retrieve something from the pile. Others photos shows the same green shirt standing over and blocking Cauley’s stuff.
In all, Cauley lost every piece of identification he had, including his veteran bus card and his social security card. Losing your ID is always a nightmare, but it’s especially horrible if you’re homeless. Any shelter he might visit or any job he might apply for requires ID.
Peery says these regular cleanups are a less-than-subtle way of herding homeless people away from popular congregating spots.
“The campaign is working,” Peery says. “I went down to Lot 16 the other day, and no one was there.” Lot 16 is an area south of the Main Library and east of the Miami River, where some 50 or 60 homeless people used to live. After the city began conducting regular street cleanings, Peery says, everyone relocated. “And it’s happening here too. You see today, people have already left.”
The Pottinger settlement did leave in place a mediation clause — where plaintiffs can request meetings with the city over perceived violations of the agreement. Peery and Waxman requested a mediation, and one was scheduled for the morning of April 24. There is no report yet on the outcome.
“I’m hoping to convince the mediator of three things,” Peery says. “Number one, to tell the city to please stop. Number two, to compensate people for all the possessions they have lost. And number three, to please guarantee this won’t happen again.”
 |
| There has never been been a better time to use this graphic |
 |
| Book Crime Family & the Miami-Dade County wants the homeless to move out to the Everglades, where there are absolutely NO resources within 2 miles of the facility, except a casino |
Tuesday, October 6, 2015
The names of Ron Book and Lauren Book will FOREVER be synonymous with the problem of homeless sex offenders in South Florida
There are lots of reasons why Lauren Book should not be trusted for public office and why Ron Book should have been fired from his position as head of the Miami-Dade Homeless Trust long ago. For almost a decade, the Book family has been synonymous with the international embarrassment that was the Julia Tuttle Causeway sex offender causeway camp. In fact, those living at the camp called the place "Bookville" after Ron and Lauren Book. [There is a lengthy and comprehensive look at this camp HERE.]
The population of Bookville increased as much as 150 before Ron Book had the place demolished in 2010. As head of the Miamo-Dade Homeless Trust, it was his responsibility to clean up the mess created by the controversial Lauren Book Child Safety Ordinance, which made roughly 99% of Miami-Dade off-limits to registered sex offenders. Ron Book never solved the problem. Instead, former Bookville residents have spent the past five years living a nomadic existence, from the Department of Corrections parking lot to Shorecrest to Allapattah to Hialeah.
Florida Action Committee, a legal reformist group, recently reported the transient camp at 7100 NW 36th Court now has over 200 "residents." Feel free to go to the Florida Sex Offender registry yourself, enter 7100 NW 36th Court as the address, Miami as the City and 1/4 mile as the radius, and see for yourself.
Despite how you feel personally about people listed on the public sex offender registry, consider the fact that Miami (and the entire state of Florida, for that matter) has become synonymous with sex offenders (like the cutscene from the Family Guy episode "Grumpy Old Man" where an entire block is "SOs").
If you are looking for someone to blame for all this, blame Ron and Lauren Book. They have made it their life's mission to make Miami a place full of homeless registrants. Ron Book uses his position as head of the Homeless Trust to push this homeless issue into other communities. As for Lauren Book, don't expect her senate bid to address much about issues other than sexual abuse. When asked about her political stance by the Miami New Times, Lauren's response was, "Political points? I want to be clear about one thing. I was raped every day for six years, and they were the six most horrible and horrific years of my life. I felt guilty, ashamed, invisible, bad, dirty, hurt, and afraid every single day from the time that I was 11 until I was 16... Children in every community on the planet are also enduring the pain I suffered. I am trying to turn my personal pain into something positive and hopefully prevent this from happening to others." I somehow doubt Lauren Book will be any better at representing the mostly good people of Ft. Lauderdale than Ron Book has been at running the Miami-Dade Homeless Camp.
Ron Book and his daughter Lauren have made people all across the world think "sex offender" whenever they think of South Florida. Voting for Lauren Book will simply solidify that view.
Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Ron Book's Dade County Commissioner patsy Jose "Pepe" Diaz BUSTED for DUI
This is Jose "Pepe" Diaz, and for years, he has been Ron Book's go-to lackey on the Dade County Commission. In fact, he is credited with writing the controversial "Lauren Book Child Safety Ordinance," the 2500 foor residency restriction law that led to the Julia Tuttle Causeway sex offender colony, otherwise known as "Bookville."
Actually, this is Pepe's MUGSHOT. You see, he was recently arrested for DUI. (HERE IS THE BODY CAM FOOTAGE if you want to see Pepe go full tilt, courtesy of the Miami Herald.) At this time there is no word if he will blame it on a brain tumor. In response Pepe said, "There goes my political career." We can only hope.
Dade Commissioner 'Pepe' Diaz caught on camera: "There goes my political career"
Posted: Sep 20, 2015 10:10 AM EDT
Updated: Sep 22, 2015 11:14 AM EDT
MIAMI (WSVN) -- Dashcam video has been released showing the moment before Miami-Dade Commissioner Jose "Pepe" Diaz was arrested over the weekend after allegedly driving his motorcycle drunk in Key West.
Diaz, known to ride a motorcycle, was arrested Saturday night following the Key West Poker Run, a charity motorcycle event.
According to Key West Police, the commissioner was pulled over at around 7:45 p.m., on South Roosevelt Boulevard near Sea Side Drive, for going 74 mph in a 30 mph zone. Authorities said, during the traffic stop, Diaz failed to put his kickstand down, causing his Harley-Davidson motorcycle to fall to the ground. According to the police report, Diaz did not place his feet down on the ground to steady the motorcycle, causing him to fall over to his side. They also noticed that he had a slight slur, his eyes were bloodshot and watery. There was also a strong alcoholic odor from his breath. Police said that was when the DUI investigation began, and he was taken into custody.
Dashcam video showed Diaz as he attempted to walk a straight line, at times stumbling during the test.
Key West Police bodycams and dashcams on the police car rolled throughout the traffic stop. According to the bodycams one Key West officer was wearing, when asked why Diaz was driving over the speed limit, Diaz apologized. "I'm Commissioner Diaz. I apologize," he said.
"You're who?" asked the officer
"Commissioner Diaz for Miami-Dade County," he responded, as he approached the officer.
"Stop right there."
That's when Diaz explained to police that he was trying to catch up to his friends. A few minutes later, he realized the severity of the stop and said, "There goes my political career."
"Sir," the officer said, "I don't make the decisions on whether you drink, you drive."
Diaz was asked to perform several sobriety tests and failed. He also refused a breathalyzer test.
Commissioner Diaz appeared before a judge Sunday, and his bond was set at $1,000. 7News was the only station there as Diaz bonded out of the Monroe County Jail, just before noon Sunday, but he refused to comment.
Under legal council, he said he could not discuss any details following his arrest. He later released a statement Monday that reads, "Under advice of my legal counsel, I cannot discuss details at this time. However, I look forward to resolving this matter. In the meantime, I will continue to serve my community and the residents of District 12 as I have done for the last 24 years, and I humbly ask for your patience during this time."
Commissioner Diaz addressed the media from his home Monday evening. "Ladies and gentlemen, I'm sorry, once again. I am extremely sorry," he said. "This is a very difficult moment for me, for my family, for my friends, for my neighbors. Especially my neighbors that please, after this, let them come back to a normality of life. It's not been easy for them. I will tell you that I will follow the judicial system, as I believe in it, like I've always believed in it. I will go through this process like anybody else that's been in this situation."
7News requested information from the Governor's Office on what steps it might take following the charges. We were told that the legal team there are looking into this case.
Diaz has served on the commission since 2002 and was previously mayor of Sweetwater. The next commission meeting is Oct. 6.
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