CAPITOL INTRIGUE
An elaborate undercover operation revolving around money, politics and a mystery developer rattles the halls of power in Tallahassee
Atlanta developer Mike Miller sat sipping a cocktail one afternoon last summer outside the spiffy Power Plant Cafe in the city’s new central park. He chatted up the head of a community redevelopment agency, spinning his grand plans to redevelop a notyet-gentrified block in the shadow of Florida’s Capitol.
The meeting was one of many Miller had with elected officials and hotshot developers, beginning in 2015, when he rolled into the steamy, Spanishmoss-draped seat of Florida state government. More south Georgia than South Beach, Tallahassee was hungry for the likes of Miller, an out-of-towner willing to spend millions to revitalize downtown as the capital city ached to rebrand itself as a place open for business.
But Miller was not what he appeared. After spending nearly two years infiltrating the burgeoning ranks of up-and-coming entrepreneurs and wooing the town’s politicians over wine and tapas, he vanished.
Until early this summer, that is, when a pair of FBI subpoenas were dropped on City Hall. Miller, it turned out, was no ordinary developer. He was an undercover FBI agent, sources close to the federal investigation said, the linchpin in an elaborate scheme to ferret out public corruption, which could lead to huge political shake-ups.
Often, Miller was accompanied by two sidekicks, who also may have been FBI undercover agents: an aspiring medical marijuana magnate from the West with blond surfer hair, and a chubby, bald leader of an energy-efficiency company.
At the time of the Power Plant meeting in July 2016, “Mike Miller” was a year into a massive, multiyear investigation of local politicians, their friends and millions of dollars in taxpayer redevelopment money. In the crosshairs may be some of Florida’s most ambitious political climbers, including its mayor, who has his sights set on the Governor’s Mansion.
Whispers of corruption are commonplace in the town halfway between Pensacola and Jacksonville. In a city teeming with lobbyists, professors and political sophisticates, officials can barely keep an arm’s length from those who seek to influence them. Over the years, rumored FBI investigations have
come and gone without charges.
This time, political gadflies are bracing for indictments to come as sure as August afternoon thunderstorms.
Public corruption is the FBI’s chief criminal investigative priority, and it’s something the bureau does very well.
The Tallahassee case whiffs of perhaps the agency’s most famous case: the undercover Abscam operation of the 1970s, which brought down dirty art dealers, phony stock traders and crooked congressmen.
“It’s very big,” said James Wedick, a retired FBI undercover agent who worked hundreds of public corruption cases at all levels of government. “Public corruption is one of the one violations that the bureau is best at handling. We’ve got the money, resources and agents to do it.”
Local governments are more vulnerable to corruption, said Wedick, because there are fewer eyes watching. Payments typically don’t need to go through the same approval process required at the state and federal level.
Really corrupt politicians deal in straight cash, but many others are willing to sell votes or other government services for surprisingly little money, Wedick said. Bribes can take the form of “street currency” — dinners and sports tickets.
In the case of Tallahassee’s Mike Miller, one of the first places he hobnobbed was the Gulf Coast resort Sandestin, where he attended the Chamber of Commerce annual retreat in 2015. It was an easy place to make a good first impression, with its focus on networking greased by open bars, dining and dancing.
Undercover agents are taught to ask questions and present problems for suspects to solve, Wedick said. Miller consistently posed the same quandary to Tallahassee officials: He wanted to build outside the redevelopment zone — who could help him get the boundaries expanded?
It’s likely someone in Tallahassee was either operating as an FBI informant or a cooperating witness. Cooperating witnesses, Wedick said, are used to introduce an undercover agent and record their conversations using surveillance equipment. “CWs,” as they’re called, are often outed when attorneys swap evidence. Informants do not record their conversations, and their identity is protected.
Many of Miller’s liaisons were facilitated by a lobbyist, Adam Corey, and his associate Nick Lowe, a former Tallahassee police officer. The duo set up the meeting at the Power Plant Cafe and others with county and city officials, including Corey’s friend Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, who is running for governor.
A FAVORABLE RESULT
After years of meetings and input from government planners, Miller got what he wanted. The day after the Power Plant Cafe meeting, the redevelopment agency, made up of members of the city and county commissions, voted on an in-theworks plan to expand — as it happened, incorporating the land he sought to develop.
Two weeks before he met with Mike Miller, Mayor Gillum introduced former president Bill Clinton to a group of Democrats at an exclusive backyard fundraiser.
The former commander in chief, wearing a blue pinstriped suit and pink tie, boasted about his wife’s success with black Southern voters and posed for pictures at $2,700 a pop. Gillum, a key part of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and on her short list for appointments, stood behind the former president. His political stock was soaring.
A year later, Gillum, 38, is a top candidate for Florida governor, but no one is talking much about the Clintons. People want to know about that meeting in mid-May over tapas and drinks with the undercover agent.
The mayor’s office acknowledged that Gillum met with Miller; an appointment with the undercover agent was noted on his calendar. His city commission colleague Scott Maddox, former head of the state Democratic Party, hasn’t said whether he met the mystery developer.
Gillum and Maddox, who wouldn’t comment for this story, are two of the most prominent politicians Tallahassee produced and are the most likely to feel political ramifications of the FBI investigation. They’ve both clung to the advice of the city’s attorney to not speak about the investigation. Gillum said he has been told by the FBI he is not a target.
Last weekend at the Chamber of Commerce gathering, the same one Miller attended two years ago, many downplayed the probe.
“All of us want to figure out what’s going on, without a doubt,” Gillum said at the retreat. “I think we have to hedge by not trying to get in front of what the facts are telling us.”
The federal subpoenas include people and companies that have been ethical thorns for both Maddox and Gillum. Among those listed are Corey, Gillum’s ex-campaign treasurer, and Corey’s restaurant the Edison, which got millions in public money to redevelop an old city electric building. The restaurant has a group of mostly secret investors, one of whom is a lobbyist for the city and another Gillum friend.
POLITICS AND FRIENDSHIP
A lobbying firm founded by Maddox and owned by his former chief of staff also is under the microscope. Paige Carter-Smith and Maddox have had a tight relationship going back to high school, mixing business, politics and friendship. Over the years, Maddox sold her more than $1 million in real estate, including a building bearing his name and the house where he lives. Maddox sold his lobbying firm to her in 2010 before returning to public office, finalizing the $100,000 deal on a hand-scrawled piece of paper.
Gillum and Maddox’s decision to remain mum on Miller is made more noticeable by the fact their colleagues have gushed details on their meetings with him, from what he wore and what he drank to the specifics of his plans.
An attorney for a person of interest in the case said there are “many targets” not listed in the subpoena. He called it the “biggest investigation in years.”
Wedick suggested the FBI must have something on Tallahassee to employ an undercover agent for so long. Agents, he said, must prove the worth of their investigation to the Justice Department and the FBI national office every six months.
“The fact that it went two years says that, to me, that he had sufficient information in there for them to justify the two-year period,” he said. “And that’s a pretty high standard.”
Tallahasseeans are accustomed to talk of the feds coming to town. Both the former mayor and schools superintendent were investigated by the FBI in recent years. Nothing came of either case.
But in a town where cozy relationships and intertwined business interests have long fueled conspiracy theories, the scope of the latest investigation suggests it’s not a matter of if but when charges will come down.