A complaint filed with the Florida Bar alleges that Bar President Roland Sanchez-Medina misappropriated $625,000 in a real estate transaction.

The Florida Bar acknowledged to the Miami Herald an open complaint regarding Sanchez-Medina, who denies any wrongdoing.

“I categorically and unequivocally deny misappropriating $625,000,” Sanchez-Medina said in an email to the Miami Herald. “I have responded to the complaint denying the accusation.”

Sanchez-Medina’s responses reference three different answers he has given about the money: paid to one company, sitting in his law firm’s trust account, paid to another company.

Sanchez-Medina works out of SMGQ Law, a Coral Gables firm that gets its first two letters from “Sanchez-Medina.” He joined the Bar in 1992, has served as Cuban American Bar Association president and, last June, was sworn in as Florida Bar president.

Beyond stating the complaint was open, the Bar didn’t disclose the status of the investigation. But, Sanchez-Medina has been asked for financial data and bank records.

Klip, Sherman Campbell, a place in the Keys and $625,000

The complaint filed Nov. 15, 2024, by Homestead’s Christos “Nicko” Christidis concerns Sanchez-Medina’s conduct during a July 2018 commercial real estate deal between Klip, LLC and Robert Morgan III’s Sherman Campbell, LLC. That led to a plethora of civil lawsuits in addition to the Bar complaint.

State records at the time listed Christidis’ Somia LLC as Klip’s manager and William Holly’s TYG, LLC as an authorized member of KLIP.

KLIP was buying an insurance business, Underwriters Inc., as well as a two-story commercial building at 102481 Overseas Hwy. in Key Largo for $1.4 million from Morgan’s company.

Christidis’ complaint says Sanchez-Medina, while acting as KLIP’s attorney, held $625,000 of the real estate deal’s $1.4 million in his trust account, but never turned it over to Morgan. Christidis and Morgan, in a Miami-Dade lawsuit against Sanchez-Medina and Holly, said that money never made it to Morgan.

The lawsuit accused Sanchez-Medina and Holly of lying by “stating verbally and in First Closing Statement, drafted by [Sanchez-Medina], on July 13, 2018 that the $625,000.00 was an escrow holdback that would be released to [Morgan] upon the closing of the sale of the asset purchase agreement…”

Christidis’ complaint says Sanchez-Medina wired $539,021 of the $625,000 to Belgium’s Bercom, a company owned by Holly partner Jacques Barrabi.

Sanchez-Medina’s Jan. 7 response to the Bar complaint, authored by Smith, Tozian, Daniel & Davis’ Gwendolyn Daniel, denied Sanchez-Medina represented KLIP in the transaction. Also, it says the $539,021 came from Berrebi’s Actis Miami Corp (principal address: SMGQ’s Alhambra Circle law office) and “pertained to a separate transaction.”

“As Mr. Christidis well knows, the $539,021 is not related to the $625,000, which is still being held in trust.”

That was filed Jan. 7. That’s not what Sanchez-Medina’s side stated on Feb. 11.

Where does Sanchez-Medina say the money is?

A section of the Jan. 7 answer, headlined “The $625,000 Buyer’s Holdback remains safeguarded in SMGQ’s Trust Account” discusses what Sanchez-Medina said during a 2023 deposition.

Pointing out the time gap between the 2018 original deal and the 2023 deposition, Sanchez-Medina’s lawyer wrote he “had not refreshed his recollection regarding the KLIP transaction that had occurred almost five years earlier, and when asked by Mr. Christidis’ lawyer (Nathan Clark), Mr. Sanchez-Medina incorrectly believed that the $625,000 had been disbursed to KLIP.”

“Subsequently, Mr. Sanchez-Medina confirmed that the $625,000.00 has remained safeguarded in trust and has not been disbursed due to the ongoing disputes that are subject to active litigation.”

But, Morgan’s amended lawsuit includes a Feb. 11 correction by Sanchez-Medina written by his attorney.

“Regrettably, after reviewing additional documentation, Mr. Sanchez-Medina has realized that the funds were disbursed shortly after the 2018 closing, at the direction of William Holly, a 50-50 member of KLIP,” the response says. “On July 26, 2018, Mr. Holly, who had executed the closing documents on behalf of KLIP, directed Mr. Sanchez-Medina to issue a cashier’s check in the amount of $687,130.71 to the Broward County Property Appraiser’s Office for the benefit of JB Green.

“Mr. Holly’s check in the amount of $62,130.71 was deposited into Mr. Sanchez-Medina’s trust account on July 27, 2018,” the response continued. “This amount was combined with the $625,000 hold back amount to cover the cashier’s check in the amount of $687.130.71. Mr. Holly was a partial owner of JB Green and Mr. Christidis managed the building owned by JB Green.”

Also, the Feb. 11 response said, Sanchez-Medina looked at the asset purchase agreement again and that “refreshed his recollection that six years ago his firm represented KLIP in the potential acquisition of the insurance assets.”

But, he says, “he did not provide legal services involving KLIP” nor did he receive any attorney’s fees “related to the closing” from anyone.

Years after the BP oil spill, ‘we face another threat that is starting to really scare the entire community,’ one lawmaker said.

The Florida House unanimously approved a bipartisan proposal on Wednesday, April 16, that effectively bans oil drilling for 52 miles along the banks of the Apalachicola River. 

Now the bill (HB 1143) goes to the Senate, where a less stringent companion bill is ready for that full chamber to consider. With the legislative session set to end by May 2, it’s anybody’s guess whether a compromise will make it to the governor’s desk.

The House proposal by Rep. Jason Shoaf, R-Port St. Joe, and Rep. Allison Tant, D-Tallahassee, prohibits the Department of Environmental Protection from approving an oil and gas drilling permit within 10 miles of the state’s three National Estuarine Research Reserves (NERRs) – which includes the Apalachicola, Tolomato Mantanzas near St. Augustine, and Rookery Bay south of Naples.  

The Apalachicola NERR has some of the highest density of fish, reptiles, and amphibians in North America and takes in nearly half of the 107-mile-long river that empties into Apalachicola Bay. 

Shoaf introduced the bill by noting the upcoming 15th anniversary of the BP Gulf oil spill (April 20) that shut down Apalachicola Bay and devastated the coastal economy. 

“We’re still carrying scars from that oil spill, just the threat of oil coming to our area completely crippled our economy. And now we face another threat that is starting to really scare the entire community,” Shoaf said. 

Last April, the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) permitted an exploratory oil well in the Apalachicola floodplain for Clearwater Land and Minerals. The decision is currently under legal challenge, but Shoaf and Tant are moving to ensure the project never gets past the exploratory stage. 

If oil were to be found then Clearwater would have to seek a permit to pump oil from the ground. “That is a whole other process,” Shoaf explained. “This would block the next permit they would have to obtain before they could commercially drill for oil.”   

Earlier Wednesday, a Senate committee cleared a companion measure (SB 1300) for it to be considered by the full chamber.

The bill by Sen. Corey Simon, R-Tallahassee, lacks the House’s outright ban but does include a requirement for DEP to conduct a “balancing test” when considering drilling applications within one mile of rivers, lakes, and other water bodies.  

The test would weigh environmental and economic concerns against the potential loss expected from an oil spill or other accidents. 

When asked about the differences between the two bills, Simon said he will meet with Shoaf for a conversation “to work things out.” 

And Shoaf said he is willing to compromise – as long as it “achieves the goal to stop drilling.” 

James Call is a member of the USA TODAY NETWORK-Florida Capital Bureau. He can be reached at jcall@tallahassee.com and is on X as @CallTallahassee.

A Florida man with the last name “Cocaine” was arrested for allegedly threatening employees at a Subway restaurant at knifepoint after he was upset by their “bad attitudes,” cops said.

Edward Cocaine, 45, was arrested over the weekend after he allegedly flipped out at a Subway in Brevard County while trying to order food with a pal.

Cocaine sparked an argument with the employees over what he believed was poor customer service, which quickly escalated after he had hurdled over the counter, pushed one of the employees and pulled out a knife, the Brevard County Sheriff said.

The knife-wielding customer was eventually talked down by his friend and they both left the restaurant, according to the sheriff.

No employees were injured, but local authorities were soon notified about the alleged threats. The Subway staffers turned over the security footage, which captured every move Cocaine made in the store, cops said.

Sheriff deputies brought Cocaine and his friend in to be interviewed shortly after. Cocaine was able to confirm that the man in the security footage was him and admitted that he “crossed the line” when he pulled out the knife, according to a post on the Brevard County Sheriff’s Office Facebook.

“In New York, you get arrested for defending people on the subway…but in Brevard County you get locked up behind bars for attacking people in a Subway!!” Sheriff Wayne Ivey wrote in the post.

“Clearly this guy, Edward Cocaine, (and yes that’s his real name) doesn’t know that in Brevard County, if you Mess Around you’re gonna Find Out…the hard way!!”

Ivey noted that Cocaine’s memory of the situation “appeared to be a bit off.”

Even so, Cocaine was charged with two counts of aggravated assault, burglary with assault or battery, and battery, which the sheriff noted gets him a one-way ticket to “Ivey’s Iron Bar Lodge.”

“He can however get food in our 1-star dining facility that is freshly prepared each day in our kitchen by inmates…sounds just yummy!!” Ivey wrote.

“So what have we learned here folks…first and foremost don’t mess around in Brevard County unless you are ready to spend the night in jail with a few new friends and while eating a less than subpar lunch!!”

In 2014, Cocaine was charged with drug possession and was nearly laughed out of the courtroom after a flabbergasted judge struggled to wrap his head around the unusual last name.

“How many times have the police told you to step out of the car in your life?” the judge asked him during his arraignment.

“Just about every time I get pulled over,” said Cocaine, who at the time was accused of having Xanax, not the illegal white powder.