Lubby Navarro, ex-School Board member accused of fraud and theft, makes court appearance
Embattled former Miami-Dade School Board member Lubby Navarro made a brief court appearance Wednesday, seated quietly in the gallery as her attorney told a judge his client satisfied the requirements of her bond and should remain out of jail through her trial date.
But when lead state prosecutor Annette Rasco said she needed more time to interview some of the people who issued Navarro the bond, Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Carlos Lopez agreed to hold off on a decision until Feb. 9. Though Navarro has already sent the court a written plea of not guilty, Feb. 9 is also the day of her formal arraignment.
“Ms. Navarro is ready for Feb. 9,” attorney Ben Kuehne said outside the courtroom Wednesday with Navarro at his side. “We will test all the evidence.”
Navarro, 49, was arrested Jan. 11 and is accused by state prosecutors of spending upwards of $100,000 of taxpayer money on some strange personal items — such as a silicone fake pregnancy belly — and to upgrade her boyfriend’s Fort Lauderdale restaurant with goods and appliances. She’s alleged to have racked up charges on two districtissued credit cards while she sat on the School Board in 2022, some of that time as vice chair. She doctored her expense reports, even whiting out some of the purchases, prior to audits, according to her arrest warrant.
She was charged with one count of organized fraud of $50,000 or more, one count of organized fraud of between $20,000 and $100,000 and two counts of grand theft. Navarro stayed in jail for two days until Jan. 13, when she posted $100,000 bond.
But because she is charged with a form of public corruption for stealing public money, the court requires her to prove that the money she used to get out of jail wasn’t acquired illegally.
Miami-Dade state prosecutors who penned Navarro’s detailed, 98-page arrest warrant said she was granted increases in her $6,000 monthly office spending account for 10 of the 12 months in 2022. In three cases, she got the district to more than double her monthly spending limit.
Navarro’s alleged misdeeds were only discovered after she resigned from the School Board in December 2022, a day before a new state law went into effect barring elected officials from working as lobbyists. Navarro, at the time, was a registered lobbyist for the South Broward Hospital District, which includes Memorial Healthcare System hospitals in Hollywood, Pembroke Pines and Miramar and Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital in Hollywood. (The hospital district has placed her on unpaid administrative leave and has launched its own investigation of her spending.)
After she stepped down from the School Board, her December 2022 expense report made its way to the school district’s chief of staff, Jose Bueno. When he looked through her report, he discovered she spent more than $13,000 in December on her credit card — more than twice the usual limit. And she had shopped a lot at Walmart and other stores, buying clothing, food and wine.
Investigators say Navarro used school-district credit cards to buy refrigerators, a wine cooler and top-of-the-line espresso machines for her ex-boyfriend’s Fort Lauderdale restaurant. She’s also alleged to have taken him and his family to Walt Disney World and then took him to Las Vegas, where they stayed at the Wynn Las Vegas hotel, all on the public dime.