Florida taxpayers have spent more than $450,000 on legal fees in a drawn-out gambling case dealing with a racing permit that could lead to more slot machines in Miami-Dade County.
The Department of Business and Professional Regulation hired the firm GrayRobinson in 2011 to handle the case because several of the department's gambling lawyers were witnesses in the lawsuit, agency General Counsel Layne Smith said Friday.
An administrative law judge sided with the agency twice in the case, most recently finding the department did nothing wrong in denying a quarter-horse permit sought by Fort Myers Real Estate Holdings Inc., which wants to open a card room and possibly offer slot machines in Florida City, near Homestead. The company intends to appeal.
The department hired GrayRobinson lawyer Bill Williams, a former Division of Administrative Hearings judge, because of his expertise dealing with regulatory issues, Smith said. The contract was signed before Smith took over as general counsel in 2011.
Williams said the $350 hourly rate he's charging the department is "substantially reduced" from his normal fees. Other GrayRobinson lawyers, Amy Schrader, Charles Upton, Andy Bardos and Ty Jackson, are being paid from $225 to $350 per hour. So far, the firm has billed the state for more than 1,400 hours of work totaling $448,733.45 since April 2011.
Williams is a "lawyer's lawyer," Smith said.
"I know what I have with Bill. He has been expensive, but he's worth it," he said.
The agency also is on the hook for nearly $80,000 in legal fees awarded to lawyers for Fort Myers Real Estate Holdings by the 1st District Court of Appeal, which ruled that the Department of Business and Professional Regulation erred when it refused to allow the Fort Myers group to appeal the agency's decision to deny the permit. The appellate court sent the case back to the division.
Smith acknowledged that the GrayRobinson price tag "is a lot of money" but blamed the permit applicants in part for the costs. The case has involved numerous and lengthy depositions and two administrative trials along with an appellate case. And it's not over yet.
"No pun intended but it's high stakes litigation," Smith said. "Gaming cases are highly contentious. I'm in a position of not controlling how hard and how long somebody's going to fight on the other side. We just have to do what we have to do. It kind of is what it is."
The agency will handle most of the next round of appeals in-house but GrayRobinson will continue to assist, Smith said.
Testimony in the case revealed that former Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer, now behind bars after pleading guilty to money laundering and theft, had tried to have gambling regulator Dave Roberts fired two days before department officials forced Roberts to resign. Greer was being paid $7,500 a month as a consultant for Mardi Gras Casino, one of several South Florida tracks opposed to quarter-horse permits. Greer never registered as a lobbyist.
GrayRobinson lobbyists also represent Mardi Gras but Smith said that isn't a problem.
"They're lawyers. They don't have a conflict. They've done a really good job," he said.
The Florida Attorney General's office, which generally handles cases for state agencies when their own lawyers don't, gave the department permission to hire the outside law firm because of the complicated nature of the proceedings, Smith said.