The Cash in the Closet

After their disentanglement, Pisano accused Ficarrotta of intimidating, hostile and offensive conduct. Her lawyer, Barry A. Cohen, complained in an August 1999 letter to Chief Judge F. Dennis Alvarez: Judge Ficarrotta has in the past indicated to Deputy Pisano that he has a close relationship with Sheriff Cal Henderson and that he was in a position to affect her job.

Pisano's fears helped set in motion investigations by a grand jury and the state Judicial Qualifications Commission, which prompted Ficarrotta to quit the bench last year.

Sordid details of the couple's affair have made it into Bay area newspapers and television newscasts for your titillation. What reporter could resist passing along the news that Ficarrotta pranced around his chambers in Pisano's thong underwear? The investigations of Ficarrotta and fellow Circuit Judge Robert H. Bonanno, who is fighting to keep his job, took on a soap-opera quality. We should have videotaped it and shown it every afternoon at four, quipped Charles E. Guthrie, supervisor of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement agents who assisted the grand jury. Bonanno was discovered after hours in Circuit Judge Gregory P. Holder's darkened chambers.

It will be awhile before the local judiciary can wash away the undignified images from public consciousness. Yet more important revelations from the Ficarrotta investigative files already seem to have been forgotten.

An Oct. 2 FDLE report summed up an interview conducted with Judge Holder. The report indicated Pisano had confided in Holder that:

She has observed large amounts of money in Judge Ficarrotta's office and believes he uses the money for personal use.

Pisano is aware of a safety deposit box filled with money in Judge Ficarrotta's office.

She is aware of a bank account to which Judge Ficarrotta and Hillsborough County Deputy Sheehan both have signature authority.

The last reference was to another bailiff, Cpl. John M. Sheehan, who counts Ficarrotta and Henderson among his fishing buddies.

Ice cream vendors keep lots of change on hand. Parking garage attendants, too. Why does a judge need to tuck away large amounts of money at the office? Obviously, it's not illegal for a judge to have cash in his chambers, said Henderson, who remains friends with Ficarrotta.

Nevertheless, Holder thought it odd. Obviously, I was concerned, Holder told Henderson's internal-affairs investigators in January. You know, you hear about a sizable amount of cash, and that just raises the specter of impropriety.

Yet this particular claim of Pisano's, which she reiterated herself during a Feb. 8 sheriff's internal affairs interrogation, has been left to linger. I did see large amounts of money in Judge Ficarrotta's office. What it was for, I don't know, Pisano said under oath. It was in his private office within the courthouse in a closet. Ficarrotta stored the cash between some computer books, Pisano said.

Unless the judge was selling a lot of Girl Scout cookies, FDLE agents should have looked at more than his choice of undergarments. Whether they did or not is unclear.

FDLE records of the investigation made public to date don't show much effort in getting to the bottom of the cash claim. FDLE lawyers did withhold some material. They said most of the records kept under wraps were related to the secret proceedings of the grand jury, which concluded its deliberations in December without issuing indictments.

The agents did examine other Pisano claims: Ficarrotta got a cell-phone bill improperly reduced, and his grown son's kidney stones treated as a dependent on his tax-subsidized health insurance policy. The former judge hasn't been charged with wrongdoing.

But did anybody with a badge follow up on Pisano's cash claim? The FDLE's Guthrie referred questions to Jerry Hill, state attorney for Hardee, Highlands and Polk counties, who was appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush as special prosecutor in the case.

That issue was, in fact, explored, Hill said earlier this month. I think that's all I'm going to say about that.

Although Alvarez has no personal knowledge of how the Ficarrotta probe was carried out, the chief judge said: I'd be surprised if Jerry Hill and the FDLE didn't subpoena some bank records.

Ficarrotta appeared before the grand jury in November. Since his testimony isn't expected to be made public, Hillsborough residents will never know if he addressed the cash-stash claim with the grand jury. Neither is a public forum in the offing, where the matter could be put to rest.

Through his lawyer, Ficarrotta declined to speak with the sheriff's internal affairs staff. Gary R. Trombley didn't respond to Weekly Planet requests to talk with him or his client.

In a Jan. 9 interview with internal affairs, Sheehan attempted to clarify some matters. The sheriff's corporal said he and Ficarrotta are best friends. As such, Ficarrotta let Sheehan and his wife use a safety deposit box that a bank had provided to the judge for free. Sheehan denied sharing a bank account with Ficarrotta. No, we've never had a shared checking account, he said. It would be very easy for the FDLE to check the banks to see, and they have not found any shared banking accounts.

The sheriff's investigators didn't ask Sheehan about money, except for his fundraising for Henderson's 2000 re-election. Sheehan received a one-day suspension from work for assisting Henderson's campaign while on duty. Ficarrotta hit up lawyers for Henderson donations, an ethical no-no for judges.

Questioning Pisano about the Ficarrotta cash, the investigators were most concerned with whether the money was intended for the Henderson campaign.

Did that have anything to do with any involvement you had in any of the campaigning for the sheriff? Cpl. William Hernandez asked Pisano.

Not to my knowledge, no, she answered.

So, just to be clear, Hernandez said. The money that you saw in Judge Ficarrotta's office had nothing to do with your activities relating to the sheriff's re-election campaign?

Not to my knowledge, Pisano assured Hernandez again. It did not. I don't know where that money came from or what it was for.

Henderson told the Planet that he was confident the cash was unconnected to his fundraising. For one thing, the sheriff said, he had no idea that Ficarrotta was soliciting money for his re-election. He added: I take very little cash when I am raising money for my campaigns. I just don't like to do it.

Henderson said Pisano's 10-day suspension was merciful, considering she could have been fired. Pisano, who also received a written reprimand, was transferred to jail duty. She thought her punishment harsh because she said Henderson's investigators cannot prove she was on duty during sexual encounters with Ficarrotta at the courthouse.

Sheehan was allowed to transfer from the courthouse to district patrol before his one-day suspension was announced.

What was Ficarrotta's punishment? True, he has lost his black robe. But the grand jury stated in a Dec. 8 presentment: We believe that the public deserves some explanation as to the reasons behind Judge Ficarrotta's resignation.

Sad as the circumstances of his courthouse departure were, Ficarrotta's resignation had one happy outcome for the judge: He won't have to answer questions from the Judicial Qualifications Commission. If only the criminal defendants who came before Ficarrotta over the years enjoyed those kind of prerogatives.

A judge's ability to halt a JQC inquiry by simply resigning is a card that other Hillsborough judges have played, too. Most recently, it was Alvarez.

Alvarez strongly denies that a JQC inquiry into his handling of the Ficarrotta-Pisano dispute and other matters forced him to resign, effective in July. My leaving had nothing to do with the JQC, said Alvarez.

In any event, the JQC's I-quit-and-you-call-off-the-dogs plank didn't sit well with the grand jury. In the presentment, the grand jury pointed out that the JQC is the official investigative body of judicial misconduct and disciplinary adviser to the Florida Supreme Court.

As in the case of Judge Ficarrotta, they operate in secrecy during their investigative stage, and should a judge resign prior to being formally charged, the investigation remains secret even if it contains evidence of a crime, the grand jury stated.

Alvarez believes a more open JQC process would benefit judges and concerned citizens. With the JQC and confidentiality, it's all one-way, said Alvarez.

On that, he and the grand jury agreed. The grand jurors speculated that, if not for their presentment, the public might never have learned of any Ficarrotta misdeeds.

We do not believe that these rules instill confidence in the judiciary or otherwise serve the public well, the grand jury stated.

As it stands now, the public has been equally disserved by the other hints of courthouse corruption that look destined to go unresolved.

Contact Staff Writer Francis X. Gilpin at 813-248-8888, ext. 130, or frangilpin@weeklyplanet.com.

This article appears in Apr 26 – May 3, 2001.