Brevard County approves funds for outside counsel in FDLE's Lober investigation
As Florida Department of Law Enforcement continues its investigation into spending by former Brevard County Commissioner Bryan Lober, the county government this week approved retaining outside lawyers for staff.
Commissioners gave the thumbs up Tuesday to reimburse county employees who may be called in for questioning by FDLE for the cost of hiring an attorney to be present at those interviews.
Concerns over Lober's spending arose last year when an anonymous public records request was sent to the commission and the media raising questions about items Lober bought using his county-issued credit card. Lober bought nearly $40,000 worth of technology and office equipment during the pandemic with money allocated to the county from federal CARES Act funds intended to assist those affected by COVID-19.
Each commissioner was allotted $5 million in federal CARES Act to spend on projects and needs around the county within the guidelines of the law.
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At his request, Lober received County Commission approval to spend up to $60,000 of his $5 million allocation to buy goods or services for government or nonprofit entities. According to the request, Lober and his staff had made the purchases, spending the money on technology and office equipment for himself, as well as for an undisclosed nonprofit.
That spending amount was a glaring outlier — nearly three times more than all the other commissioners combined.
Lober insisted at the time that he violated no laws, and followed County Commission rules on spending and purchases. Lober tendered his resignation effective April 1 of last year, citing a death in his family.
The Brevard County Clerk of Courts office began an audit, but announced in November that FDLE was also investigating. As the investigation into Lober continues, FDLE agents have been seeking interviews with county staff to look into spending. According to county spokesman Don Walker, FDLE advised the county that its own attorneys could not legally represent employees on the matter, prompting worries about how they would pay for their right to legal protection.
"Some of our employees may have information related to the case. Our county manager and our commissioners believe that our employees should have legal representation during those interviews," Walker said.
"So the county will reimburse staff for the costs. But employees can only hire somebody that we agree on on the front-end," he added.
Although employees will be able to choose their own representation, it won't be entirely at their discretion in order to keep costs down, Walker said. Walker said he could not provide further details on what information law enforcement may be seeking, saying that FDLE was remaining tight-lipped over the nature of the open investigation.
When reached by email, FDLE spokeswoman Dana Kelly wrote only: "Our investigation is active. We don’t have additional information to share at this time."
This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Brevard County approves funds to pay for lawyers in FDLE investigation
