Jan. 19--Doral Police Chief Ricky Gomez will not face criminal charges after state investigators examined allegations that he rigged bids to buy office furniture and misappropriated taxpayer money to help pay for a swearing-in ceremony at a local resort.
A state attorney's memo released this week say there is no evidence that Gomez committed any crimes.
"Ricky Gomez is not a corrupt individual," Gomez said Tuesday. "Ricky Gomez is the victim of a political witch-hunt."
Gomez, a former Miami-Dade Police officer, has been Doral's police chief since 2008, when the department was established .
He and attorney Ibrahim Reyes-Gandara say they are mulling legal action against the "network of conspirators."
The investigation began in April 2011 when anonymous letters blasting Gomez were forwarded to the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office.
Florida Department of Law Enforcement began an investigation and had been prepared to arrest Gomez last year, but prosecutors declined to press charges.
According to FDLE, Gomez wanted a swearing-in ceremony at the Doral Golf Resort and Spa, but the city manager said there was not enough money.
At the time, a company called Emergency Vehicle Supplies, owed Doral $28,000 for "overages" paid as part of its contract with the department. Evidence showed Gomez had the company issue a check directly to the resort for the ceremony.
City leaders said they thought most of the cost of the elaborate event was donated, the FDLE report said.
"Upon review by [prosecutors], it was determined that the secret misappropriation of city funds was highly 'unethical and wrong,' but it did not violate Florida state statute because the funds were used to pay for a quasi-public event that ultimately benefited Doral," the FDLE report said.
Public corruption prosecutor Isis Perez, in her final memo, wrote: "City funds were used for a city function ... there was no crime committed."
Gomez said Tuesday he never knew that EVS owed the city money.
The second criminal probe revolved around the purchase of office furniture for the new department. Former Doral Police Cmdr. James Montgomery told agents that Gomez put out a "bid" for furniture, then contacted one firm, Corporate Express, to leak information on a competitor's proposal.
Montgomery claimed Gomez asked employees to "shred" Corporate Express' original bid and replace it with a new one for a lower price. All lies, said the chief, who insisted he was following procedures handed down by then-manager Sergio Purrinos.
"I never ordered anybody to shred anything," Gomez said.
Prosecutors agreed, saying Gomez did not violate the state's bid tampering law because the city waived the formal bidding process, and neither the chief nor the company "illegally profited from the contract."
The FDLE report also chronicles several investigations that prosecutors said were "administrative," not criminal matters.
According to the report, "testimony and evidence" revealed that Gomez ordered an internal affairs sergeant to "alter his investigative findings" into a detective who was a political enemy of Mayor J.C. Bermudez. But Gomez says the FDLE investigation misconstrued how Doral internal affairs investigations are conducted.
Another probe looked at the city's use of donated money for the Police Explorer program, which introduces youths to law enforcement. But while agents determined that "some misuse of funds may have occurred" in purchasing some items and "greater transparency and oversight" was needed, the investigation revealed that all the money was accounted for and that there were no strict rules governing how the money should be spent.
Gomez says FDLE's probe distorted the truth and was pushed by political enemies bent on tarnishing his image.
Copyright 2012 - The Miami Herald
