RANDY BRUNSON
Charged with the same offense that is about to cost NORM COLEMAN his Senate seat, Republican RANDY BRUNSON already lost a County Commission seat when the Ponte Vedra Recorder blew the whistle and covered the story.
Now failed St. Johns County Republican County Commission candidate RANDY BRUNSON faces a November 12, 2008 Probable Cause hearing in Tallahassee before the Florida Elections Commission. In case no. FEC 08-137, BRUNSON is charged with receiving free or reduced rent from hotelier KANTI PATEL for his campaign headquarrters. BRUNSON paid no rent for months, while paying for utilities. After the complaint was filed, BRUNSON filed a notarized lease, purporting to be paying only $100/month for prime property on Ponce de Leon Boulevard.
While the Ponte Vedra Recorder reported the charge against RANDY BRUNSON before the August 26, 2008 primary, not one word of it appeared in the St. Augustine Record.
The hearing will take place in the Senate Office Building, 404 S. Monroe Street, Room 401, Tallahassee, Florida.
BRUNSON is represented by attorney MARK HERRON, who is also a lawyer for the Florida Democratic Party and Democratic candidates. How utterly disappointing.
Is this a conflict of interest on MARK HERRON's part? Bad taste in client selection? Divided loyalties? Cynical lobbyist representing all parties?
"I can represent anyone I want," RANDY BRUNSON's defense lawyer MARK HERRON said.
Indeed, he can.
"That's none of your business."
He's wrong. As an elected member of the St. Johns County Democratic Executive Committee, I'll be damned if some impertinent energumen will represent both Florida Democrats and Republicans. It's wrong. It's an appearance of impropriety. It is unseemly. HERRON hung up the telephone on me -- thrice -- when I asked him about BRUNSON and the BRUNSON case and Herron's conflict of interest.
We don't need to be sharing our confidences with a maniacal jerk.
In Tallahassee, is there only one political party -- the party of lugubrious lobbyist-goobers and gooberettes, to whom open, honest government is but a punchline?
What do you reckon? "I have no obligation to talk to you about anything," HERRON said, mocking my typing his answers.
It's pretty funny alright -- the same lawyer representing our Democratic Party is representing RANDY BRUNSON.
Neither BRUNSON nor HERRON have to talk to me. But on November 12, 2008 at 11:30 AM, HERRON and BRUNSON get five minutes to explain to the Florida Elections COmmission why there should not be a determination of probable cause that BRUNSON broke the law by accepting free rent from hotelier KANTI PATEL. Will BRUNSON take the Fifth Amendment because BRUNSON's overt acts may also constitute federal crimes, including possible violations of the Hobbs Act and RICO?
Conflicted Tallahassee power lawyer MARK HERRON, who represents RANDY BRUNSON and other Republicans as well as Democrats before the FLorida Elections Commission.
MARK HERRON's firm biography states:
Mark Herron
Direct telephone: (850) 425-5217
Email: mherron@lawfla.com
Mark Herron concentrates his practice on ethics and elections law, legislative representation, administrative law and appellate practice.
Mr. Herron received his undergraduate degree from The Florida State University (B.A., cum laude) in 1972, and his law degree from The Florida State University (J.D., with honors) in 1975.
He served as a member of the State of Florida Commission on Ethics from 1984-1988, serving as its Chairman in 1987-1988. He has served as the Executive Director and General Counsel to the Florida House of Representatives. Mr. Herron has also served as the Staff Director of the Florida House Select Committee on Reapportionment and the Florida House Committee on Commerce.
Mr. Herron is a member in good standing of The Florida Bar and the State Bar of Georgia. He is also a member of the American Bar Association, the Federal Bar Association and the Tallahassee Bar Association. He is admitted to practice in the United States Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals of the Eleventh Circuit, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Florida, the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida, and the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.
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