Saving Veldora's pension...

Our sources tell us that there is a meeting taking place today within the City of Miami whose sole objective is to figure out how to save convicted fraudster and former City of Miami Assistant Fire Chief Veldora Arthur's pension.  Ms Arthur was convicted and sentenced for her role in a massive multi million dollar mortgage fraud scheme last year, since then there's been strong opposition within the ranks of both the fire department and the City of Miami to Ms Arthur being able to collect her pension.

What makes today's meeting all the more interesting is that I'm told that former City of Miami Police Chief and City Manager Donald Warshaw is keeping a close eye on the proceedings, for those of you who don't remember Mr. Warshaw, this story from the Miami Herald sums up his situation...

Former Miami Police Chief Donald Warshaw is not entitled to his six-figure annual police pension, forfeited when he was convicted of diverting $70,000 from a charity for his personal use, a state appellate court ruled Wednesday.

In a 2-1 decision, a Third District Court of Appeal panel of judges backed last year's decision by Miami's Firefighters & Police Officers Retirement Trust to stop paying Warshaw's pension of about $128,800 a year.


Warshaw, who retired as police chief to become city manager in 1998, avoided a conviction for using public office to steal public money as part of his plea deal with the U.S. attorney's office. Such a conviction would automatically have forfeited his pension, according to Florida statues.

Interesting, if Ms. Arthur somehow manages to keep her pension despite her federal fraud convictions, it's going to set a dangerous precedent.  If she gets to keep her pension then by default, wouldn't Mr. Warshaw be entitled to keep his pension as well?  For that matter, wouldn't any city or county employee who lost their pensions due to a criminal conviction be entitled to get their pension benefits back?  

We'll keep an eye on this situation and report back as soon as we learn anything.  More tomorrow on the Airways Tag Agency boondoggle.