File photo by Mitchell Zachs/Magicalphotos.com

By Rebecca Wakefield

Miami’s Office of Appearances was in full swing this week. Mayor Manny Diaz appeared in a glamour shoot in a national magazine, smoking, drinking and playing dominoes on City Hall’s back patio while his administration crumbles. Former City Commissioner Johnny Winton, who apparently has no shame whatsoever, filed a petition asking the courts to put him back into office, since Gov. Charlie Crist wisely declined to accommodate him earlier this year.

Not only that, but press reports surfaced that former City Manager Joe Arriola, who developed a beef with Diaz after he was shoved (much too late) out of City Hall last year, is “cooperating” with the State Attorney’s Office in its various never-ending investigations of city government. Also, former Operations chief Mary Conway, an Arriola ally who was fired after her less-than-stellar work in the city’s Capital Improvements Department was finally acknowledged, filed a grievance with the city’s Civil Service Board, claiming she was made a scapegoat for the misdeeds of others. And I wouldn’t be surprised if former Community Development head Barbara Gomez throws the administration another curve ball at some point.

But the worst case of dressing bullshit up in a fancy uniform had to be the case of Miami Police Chief John Timoney. CBS 4 reporter Gary Nelson aired an excellent report about the chief driving a free Lexus SUV for a year and never reporting it.  

When confronted, Timoney, through his staff, denied it, lied about it, then tried to excuse it. Only the Miami Herald’s gutless editorial board bought the BS when Timoney claimed he would just buy the car and put the inquisition to rest.

Timoney should be fired immediately if we are to have any faith in our police department. I nearly choked when I read the Herald editorial line, “We commend the chief for his change of heart and doing the right thing.”

Is Timoney a 5-year-old kid we’re trying to pat on the back after making him return the candy he pinched from the corner store? Timoney is fast approaching the age of 60 and has been a cop for roughly four decades, in three big, corruption-prone cities (New York, Philadelphia and Miami). He makes something like 200 grand a year when you add in all his bennies and perks.

We don’t expect the guy to be a saint, even if he likes to project the image of an Irish warrior priest with a fifth of whiskey and a pair of brass knuckles on his desk. We forgive him if he drinks too much now and then, or swears at us while riding his bike. We don’t blame him for his son’s troubles with drug trafficking.

But we do expect a police chief not to be such a liar, thief and coward. Let me spell this out. When CBS 4’s Gary Nelson found that Lexus of Kendall had been letting him drive around a $53,000 SUV with dealer plates for about a year, Timoney’s first impulse was to have a department spokesman tell Nelson, “The Chief says he leases the Lexus. He pays for the car; there isn't a story here.”

Then when Nelson persisted, the spokesman said, “He’s test-driving it. He’s thinking about buying one.” When that explanation didn’t wash (after Nelson pointed out the various state and local ethics laws, and department policy Timoney had violated), the chief had his assistant send a laughable statement saying he’d done nothing wrong because the dealership isn’t inside city boundaries, but would get an ethics opinion. “Bear in mind, that at most, this would be a failure to file a form, and in no way constitutes any legal wrongdoing.”

Nelson appeared on Jim DeFede’s AM-940 WINZ morning radio show on Tuesday to talk about, as Nelson put it, “what might be a test drive for the record books.”

DeFede, like most of us, was outraged. “You cannot turn on cable TV without finding John Timoney promoting himself in his nice uniform,” he raged. “John Timoney is a media whore. But when it deals with his department, with his behavior, then suddenly he’s camera shy.”

DeFede then asked Nelson why would Lexus of Kendall give him a free car for a year? “The 53,000 question, Jim, is exactly as you have put it — why? Why would Lexus of Kendall provide Miami’s chief of police free use of a luxury automobile? It’s a question the chief has not answered and it’s a question executives at Lexus of Kendall have declined to respond to.”

So Timoney steals the public trust, hides behind his staff and lies until he has no more room to maneuver. He’s done, far as I’m concerned, although I think Manny Diaz will do whatever he can to keep his chief. The two are friends, but beyond that, Diaz doesn’t want to see yet another cornerstone of his reform agenda dissolve.

Also, Diaz is himself familiar with rationalizing bad behavior. Remember when he bought property with his City Manager Arriola and commissioner pal Winton, then got a huge raise orchestrated by them? He felt the tiniest of stings from an ethics commission fine, but it was clear from his comments that he didn’t think he’d really done anything wrong. It was more of a nuisance than a come-to-Jesus moment.

I thought about this when I saw the September issue of Esquire that hit mailboxes recently. To the world outside Miami, Diaz has successfully positioned himself as the go-to mayor for the gratuitous photo-op, as in Esquire’s spread on the U.S. Conference of Mayors. They shot three dozen mayors.

Diaz wore a black Versace suit and silk tie and confessed that his reasons for running for office were the city’s financial insolvency, and high rates of unemployment, and ethnic divisions. He got off to a good start, but here we are a few years later with similar problems.      

The mayor said he likes to relax by inviting people to his office terrace to play dominoes, drink and smoke cigars. That is cool and all, but it reveals such a disregard for reality. I understand that people got swept up in that whole “we’re building Manhattan and we’ll all be rich” mentality, but that died not long before the foreclosures and mortgage fraud cases started to expose the gap.

As our economy tanks, so does Diaz’s administration collapse under the weight of problems it won’t admit. Mary Conway, whose “whistleblower” complaint was first reported by the Daily Business Review, could expose some unfortunate cracks. The traveling circus that is Joe Arriola is definitely going to be a problem. The Johnny Winton case is one more indication that the real estate business is suffering (because he’s really just fighting for his lucrative pension), and that serving the public is not the top priority for any of this group. The priority seems to be — what can I get away with and for how long?

Earlier this year, Chief Timoney was quoted by The New Yorker (in an otherwise glowing profile) about his son Sean’s marijuana distribution case. “Sometimes you need the lever of the criminal justice system to jerk somebody,” Timoney said.

I couldn’t agree more. CBS 4 followed up its report with news that City Manager Pete Hernandez had ordered Timoney to return the car to the dealer. He said he bought it, so I’m unclear what the final deal was. The station also said the Florida Department of Revenue is looking into whether the chief paid taxes on that year-long test drive. I doubt the inquiries will end there.

Comments? E-mail wakefield@miamisunpost.com.