The Pensacola Police Department's refusal to enforce the law caused great harm to me and my husband

I reported to the Pensacola Police Department (PPD) that Pensacola City Officials were running an illegal scam on Pensacola residents by verbally demanding a new Certificate of Occupancy (CO) on change of tenant, even if the classification stayed the same, which was against the construction regulation, the Standard Building Code (SBC). The PPD refused to stop this illegal demand even though City Officials used this made-up illegal requirement in order to steal historic artifacts, steal building materials, steal life savings, etc. - effectively running a grand theft ring out of City Hall.

I informed City Officials (City Manager Bonfield, Building Department Director Wilkinson, City Attorney Caton, PPD, etc.) that their demand was illegal and that the law had no requirement for us in order to operate our newly purchased business; that it was legal for us to operate our business immediately.  I refused to submit to their unwritten, illegal policy.  City Officials refused to obey the construction regulation, the SBC, which stated that a new CO on change of tenant when the classification stayed the same was not appropriate. 

 

City Officials used extortion, threats of possible arrest, almost daily trespassing on our property (without a warrant and without our permission) and harassment with false complaints against us to force us to stay closed. City Officials illegally refused us the operation of our business for almost two years. Even though we repeatedly reported these illegal actions to the PPD, the PPD sided with the City Officials who appeared to be committing felonies against us.

We finally submitted to the City Officials' illegal demands since we were going bankrupt since we were paying out (mortgage payments, utilities, etc.) but officials refused us income from our business.  All officials all the way up to Governor Jeb Bush,, that we reported the illegal demands to, sided with the law breakers. The City Officials' illegal demands did not involve any items in their area of supervision and requirements (plumbing, roof, etc.) but consisted of what is considered cosmetic - removing historic artifacts from our historic building.  City Officials forced a contractor on us, Mr. Miller, who stole many of our historic overmantels, stole all of the veranda spindles (over 500) and the rails with them, stole building materials we had ordered, stole shutter hardware from the outside of the house, stole many interior architectural features, and on and on.

Since he was protected by City Officials, Mr. Miller freely bragged about grand theft of our property to his friends and to the Escambia County Contractors Competency Board Inspector who put Mr. Miller's confession in his official report. State Law required a Board to report crimes encountered to law enforcement officials.  The Escambia County Contractors Competency Board did not report Mr. Miller's crimes (even though he freely confessed) to anyone and determined he had done nothing wrong.  The Escambia County Board did not revoke his contractor's license and did not attach the official complaint I had made to his record.  He was free to continue contracting, free to abandon projects, and free to continue committing grand theft.  Unfortunately, he victimized another couple, this time in Santa Rosa County and the Santa Rosa Officials obeyed Florida Statutes and revoked his contractor's license for 5 years.

We reported his grand theft to the PPD based on our knowledge and based on his confession which was in the Escambia County's official record although the Escambia County Officials, even the Escambia County Sheriff, had refused to take any action against Mr. Miller.

The PPD refused to arrest the contractor and officially allowed him to keep everything he had stolen from us.  This is documented in the Official Pensacola Police Department Investigation which is located online in cipensacolaflus.com, memo dated 08/14/2000, Subj: 520 North Spring Street – responses to Ms. Mary Mead's complaints. The Official Police Report is printed on pages 24 to 32. Investigator Stone stated on page 25, “Miller states in the record he has some materials of Meads he is holding because Mead owes him money.” The “record” referenced above is the official report of the investigation of the Escambia County Contractor's Competency Board where Mr. Miller confessed to committing grand theft against us. I had submitted all invoices from Mr. Miller to Investigator Stone. They were marked “paid in full” by Mr. Miller which proved that we did not owe him any money. Committing grand theft is not allowed in Florida under any circumstances but the PPD investigator used this false, unfounded claim by Mr. Miller to allow him to keep tens of thousands of dollars of our property. Even if we owed Mr. Miller money, which we did not, Florida Statutes require Mr. Miller to file a mechanics lien on our property to recoup any money he says he is owed instead of committing grand theft against us.

Investigator Stone's official report consisted of rumors and gossip devised to protect the City Officials and the contractor from felony charges.

City Manager Bonfield, City Attorney Caton and Building Director Wilkinson along with the Pensacola Planning Board framed me by constructing an amendment to the zoning code book, the Land Development Code (LDC), requiring a new CO on change of tenant and pretended it was the official building code when it was not. Florida Statutes list the valid building codes. The LDC was not one but the SBC was. Amending the SBC would have been difficult since it required prior notice, advertising, an official hearing, etc.  Amending the LDC was easier especially when City Officials used "minor changes" to describe the supposed new requirement, hiding the fact that is changed CO requirements, so that no one, including me, would know that "minor changes" was supposed to change the CO requirements.  While the LDC cannot change the CO requirement, they were pretending they had officially changed the CO requirement. 

 

Officials illegally used the LDC to steal our life savings, building materials and historic artifacts. I reported these illegal actions to the Pensacola City Council, Pensacola Police Chief, the Escambia County Sheriff, the State Attorney, and Governor Jeb Bush. All of these individuals stood firmly behind the requirements of the invalid and false LDC in denying my official request for City Officials to obey the law (the Standard Building Code) and leave me and my historic property alone.

City Officials framed me with these illegal actions so they could illegally say that I was the bad one and they used the false “regulations” to violate my constitutional rights by continuing to illegally come on my property, without a warrant and without my permission, to further their grand-theft scheme which appeared to be criminal (mostly felonies). 

 

In addition to City Officials changing the wrong regulation, I also stated that I had no change of tenant after the effective date of the change to the LDC. City Officials ignored this additional illegal action on their part and again violated my constitutional rights since the Constitution forbids ex post facto – which means holding me responsible for a regulation created after the action (change of tenant).

I appeared on TV at City Council Meetings and revealed the illegal scam. This was difficult because many council members and Mayor Fogg tried to shut me up.  After I spoke, City Manager Bonfield  denied any illegal activity, Mayor Fogg refused to let me respond to Mr. Bonfield's false statements by making up a parliamentary rule - he said that Robert's Rules of Order stated that a speaker could not respond to false statements made against them unless a Council Member asked them a question.  I knew this was false since I was a past President of a local Toastmistress Club that used Robert's Rules of Order as our parliamentary procedure.  Councilman Nobles gaveled me down when he was acting for Mayor Fogg and threatened me with being charged with libel.  Councilman Wiggins stated again and again that City Officials were not breaking the law and he was upset and angry with me for saying they were.

 

Even with their misbehavior, I was able to get the message out.  There was a public outcry which induced City Officials to stop their illegal demands. Thankfully, three members of the City Council, City Council Member Rita Jones, City Council Member Debra Thompson and City Council Member Reverend Hugh King revolted against this illegal policy and brought it to a halt. On page 59 of the Pensacola City Council Minutes dated January 27, 2000: “COUNCIL MEMBER KING: . . . I just want to say this is another one of those good situations where, you know, the citizens speak up. This has been – well, I guess I do need to compliment Ms. Mead for being very vigilant in kind of directing us to a point where we can all agree – and even she can even agree that the situation is much better.”

I did approve of the City Officials finally agreeing to obey the SBC, the official construction regulation, and discontinue their illegal grand theft actions.  I did not approve of the City Officials lying by saying they had to amend the LDC again to remove this requirement.  The real regulation, the SBC, had stayed the same which had always denied the new CO requirement on change of tenant. City Officials had never had any kind of authority to make their illegal policy to require a new CO on change of tenant but had always been committing unauthorized trespass, unauthorized lies and force, and grand theft against the people of Pensacola.  

I repeatedly reported the magnitude of the illegal conspiracy to commit grand theft on Pensacola property owners, especially owners of historic properties, but all officials denied anything illegal had happened.

City Officials never made restitution for conspiring, through illegal demands, to keep our business illegally closed for almost two years to force us to comply with their illegal demands. City Officials never made restitution for conspiring, also through illegal demands, to steal our (my husband and I) life savings, to put us deep in debt, and to steal valuable building materials. City Officials refused to return our stolen historic artifacts and gave the historic artifacts to the contractor who stole them instead of returning the stolen historic artifacts to the building they had been made for and which they had been attached to, a part of, for over 115 years.

I repeatedly reported many instances where City Officials appeared to commit illegal/criminal actions.  The latest report I made to the PPD was to Police Chief Alexander III in December, 2015.  Some excerpts follow: 

"I reported to you, via email dated December 10, 2015, Subj: Illegal closing of our authorized business without due process, that the Pensacola Police Department came on our property on March 19, 2005, without a warrant or any paperwork whatsoever and illegally closed our business down.  The United States Constitution, Amendment 5, requires due process in this situation."

Chief Alexander III refuses to lift the illegal prohibition on us operating our business as legally authorized. 

"I reported to you that on Sep 9, 2010, it appears that Florida State Attorney, Mr. Bill Eddins, the Pensacola City Attorney, Mr. Wells, and Pensacola Community Development Department employee, Ms. Morris conferred and discussed the answer Mr. Wells was going to send to Mr. Ramage of the FDLE regarding my reporting to FDLE, again, the illegal closing of our small business, an art gallery/antique shop holding functions, on March 19, 2005. It appears that they decided to send false statements and false charges about us to FDLE instead of the real facts:  we were authorized many times (latest in 2000 and in 2001) to hold functions, we operated in compliance with all rules and regulations, we were illegally closed down without due process by the Pensacola Police Department on March 19, 2005, etc.  It appears the above individuals deliberately conspired to and, in fact, did lie to FDLE about us."

 

Chief Alexander III refuses to address rampant corruption in Pensacola which is harming us.

 

"I reported to you, via email dated December 10, 2015, Subj:  Violation of Florida Statutes, that Pensacola City Officials were violating Florida State Statute 112.313 regarding the appointment and reappointment of individuals to Pensacola Advisory Boards who have a conflict-of-interest.  In addition, I reported to you that illegal members committed perjury, according to Florida Law, in swearing that they were eligible to be members of these boards when they were not eligible."

 

Chief Alexander III refuses to stop City Officials from violating Florida Laws.

 

In addition to the PPD, Mayor Hayward and City Council members ignore my reports of apparent illegal/criminal actions and pretend that Pensacola does not have a serious corruption problem.  The Escambia County Officials and Florida State Officials refuse to address and stop the corruption we are burdened with in Pensacola.  Even though the Florida Constitution appears to require County services for City dwellers when they pay County taxes, Sheriff Morgan refuses us law enforcement services.  Sheriff Morgan came into Pensacola to campaign - asking us to vote for him.  Sheriff Morgan put up signs in Pensacola directing us to lock our car doors, but when we report a crime against us, Sheriff Morgan refuses to address the crime.  In the future, if a candidate refuses law services to Pensacola, since, according to law, we should receive them, we should refuse to vote for that candidate and only vote for a candidate who will obey the Florida Constitution and provide good law enforcement services to us.  Sheriff Morgan and Chief Alexander III seem to be annoyed when we ask for their services and dump us - drowning in corruption and living in the murder capital of Florida.  Their attitude appears to be "Shut up and leave me alone."  We are then forced to try to handle the crime on our own, report it up the line of responsibility and hope for the best.  I have been scammed and defrauded out of at least $300,000.00 (I have the receipts) plus the historic artifacts stolen by Mr. Miller.  My husband and I had carefully planned to use the income from our business to augment our pensions.  City Officials illegally deny us any income for our officially authorized business.  We have been illegally closed down for two years before (to force us to submit to their illegal demands) and 11 years after (to sadistically, brutally punish us for defending ourselves from their illegal actions) the brief period of almost 5 years when we were allowed to operate our business as legally authorized.  At all times we were is complete compliance with all laws regarding the operation of our business downtown. 

 

President-elect Trump has repeatedly promised to stop corruption in government in America when he takes office. I plan to test his promise.  Even now, I am sending reports of the rampant corruption in Pensacola to some appointees he has already made:  Homeland Security and the United States Attorney General.  Both of these positions are supposed to address and stop corruption.

I have three blogs that address corruption in Pensacola:  pensacolanewsletter.blogspot.com, pensacolanewsletter2.blogspot.com, and pensacolanewsletter3.blogspot.com,