JUST DESSERTS

Gaetz’s ‘Wingman’ to Pay Florida County $1.3M Over Misused Tax Dollars

Joel Greenberg, the disgraced local tax official, agreed to wire Seminole County the money more than two years after he was first dragged to federal court on 33 charges.

A former Florida tax official and onetime chum of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) will pay a local government more than $1.3 million in restitution to make up for the funds he is accused of misusing while in office. The formal agreement between Joel Greenberg and Seminole County comes more than two years after he was first hauled to federal court on 33 charges—the result of what prosecutors called “a bold, brazen, and nearly undeterrable crime-spree” in a memorandum filed Tuesday, ahead of a sentencing hearing set for December. Last May, Greenberg pleaded guilty to six of the federal charges against him, including sex trafficking of a minor, identification theft, wire fraud, and stalking. (His 84-page plea agreement did not mention Gaetz by name, and in September prosecutors recommended against charging the senator in a related sex-trafficking probe.) The restitution deal, according to Seminole County Attorney A. Bryant Applegate, will cover the losses from Greenberg’s spending habits, including his use of agency credit cards on things like body armor, a thermal-imaging drone, and a cryptocurrency mining rig that caused a fire in his office.