Former FloridaGov. JebBush says heisn’t interested in running for president in2012. And every time he says it, it makesRepublicans pine for his candidacymore.

BY MARK PUENTETimes Staff Writer

Unscrupulous real estate professionals whodefraud clients or otherwise break the rules cansleep soundly knowing three things:• The investigation will likely take so long thattheywill have plenty of time to prey onmore vic-tims.• Even if they eventually lose their license, theyrarely face criminal prosecution.• And a prison sentence is nearly out of thequestion, even in themore egregious real estate-related cases.Examples abound.There’s the Miami broker who failed to turn

over rental money. The initial investigation tookso long he bilked several more clients before hislicensewas finally revoked.And the Hillsborough broker who admitted

in writing to misusing more than $120,000 andeventually had his license suspended for “theftof funds.” Even he didn’t face criminal charges.The findings come from a recent St. Petersburg

Times analysis of data from the Florida Divi-sion of Real Estate, the agency set up to protectconsumers from dishonest real estate agents,appraisers and instructors. Cases involved a fewhundred dollars to tens of thousands. Of the1,595 cases the agency sent to state attorney’s

“None of the candidates talking about running nowreally stands out, but Jeb Bushwould be really strong,’’saidAdamHubler of Virginia, amonghundreds of con-servative activists gathered in Washington, D.C., lastweek for the annual Conservative Political Action Con-ference.Between speeches by potential presidential con-

tenders including Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich andTimPawlenty, true believers could take turns throwing

eggs at a picture of Al Gore.“There’s no question Jeb Bush is one of, if not the,

most popular Republican in the country, but the fact ishe’s not running,’’ saidRonKaufman, a veteranRepub-lican strategist who helped Jeb’s father win the WhiteHouse in 1988.In 2010, Senate candidates likeMarco Rubio in Flor-

ida and Pat Toomey in Pennsylvania showed Republi-

WASHINGTON

Please, Jeb. Pretty please? ¶ To hear a growing number of conservative activists tell it,the person best equipped to excite Republicans and beat Barack Obama in 2012 is aman who has no intent to run. ¶ The Jeb Bush chatter says as much about the seem-

ingly anemic Republican presidential field slowly taking shape for 2012 as it does about theformer Florida governor’s stature in the GOP. At this point in the 2008 presidential cycle,more than adozen candidates had announced or filed paperwork to raisemoney,while todayonly oneRepublican— formerGodfather’s Pizza CEOHermanCain—has announced.

STORYBYADAMC. SMITH | Times Political Editor

JIM DAMASKE | Times

BY LETITIA STEINTimes Staff Writer

Susan Martin stopped at nearly everydrugstore between her doctor’s Tampaoffice and her North Pinellas home. Butbig chain stores and small independentsall turned away her prescription for herdebilitating back pain.The next day, the former nurse called

26 different pharmacies before find-ing one that would sell her oxycodone,the drug now blamed for more over-dose deaths in Florida than heroin andcocaine combined.

After years of watching the prescriptiondrug abuse crisis escalate, law enforcementandmedical authorities are seriously crack-ingdownonoxycodoneandothernarcotics.As a result, oxycodone is getting harder

to findandmore expensive tobuy throughlegitimate channels. With demand stillbrisk, some local pharmacies reportedlyare charging more than $6 for a pill thattypically retails for about $1. Some say theprice is also rising on the street, where“oxy” — one of the most widely abusedprescription narcotics — can run around

Reality limitsreal estateoversightDuring the housing collapse, thenumber of cases of shady dealsrose, but investigations slowed.

Getting pills a pain for legitimate patientsAbuse of painkillersmeans greater restrictions on the drugs. “Are they

selling it? Arethey really inpain? I can’tbe judgingeverybody,”DunedinMedicineShoppepharmacistand ownerSteve Amatosays ofoxycodonebuyers.

. See PILLS, 10A

. See JEB, 10A

. See REAL ESTATE, 14A

DON MORRIS | Times

RxOD | The prescription drug abuse crisis in Florida

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Times wires

CAIRO — A new era dawned in Egypt on Sat-urday as this nation of 80 million — and hun-dreds of millions beyond its borders — beganto absorb the fact that an 18-day mass move-ment of largely nonviolent protest broughtdown a nearly 30-year military dictatorship andrenewed the country’s lease on life.Ordinary Egyptians carried their party into a

second day as they sang, danced and cheered inTahrir Square in ecstasy over the fall of formerPresidentHosniMubarak.Egypt’s newarmy leadershipquickly sought to

project its control and assuage fears about mili-tary rule, at home and abroad. At the same time,opposition leaders took steps toward assertingtheir own role in the country’s future.A spokesman, Gen. Mohsen el-Fangari,

appeared on state TV in front of a row of Egyp-tianmilitary and national flags and read a state-ment from the military’s Supreme Council, pro-claiming that themilitary is “looking forward toa peaceful transition… to permit an elected civilauthority to be in charge of the country to builda democratic, free nation.”The announcement said that Egypt would

continue to abide by all of its international andregional treaties — which include its peacetreaty with Israel — and that the current civilian

In Egypt,start ofnew eraWithHosniMubarak out, themilitary, protesters and parts ofthe old regime vie for new roles.

. See EGYPT, 7A

Associated Press

An Egyptian boy waves the national flag ashe celebrates near Tahrir Square in Cairoon Saturday, a day after President HosniMubarak stepped down.

14A | Sunday, February 13, 2011 | St. Petersburg Times * * * *

. REAL ESTATE continued from 1A

offices in the two years from Jan. 1, 2009, to Dec. 31, 2010, the Times found: • The average Division of Real Estate investigation took more than 18 months. Forty took three years or longer. The longest: a contract violation that started in November 2004 and went to prosecutors in January 2009.• The time lapse allowed more than 100 real estate profession-als to commit additional mis-deeds while the initial complaint was still being investigated.• Of the 33 most egregious cases — ones in which the real estate board eventually revoked or sus-pended the license — only three were charged with a crime.

State Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, a member of the sen-ate’s Governmental Oversight and Accountability Committee, said the investigations take “far too long.”

“(They) need to get their act together,” he said. “They have major flaws. They need to do something.”

Division of Real Estate director Thomas O’Bryant Jr. defended the lengthy investigations and stressed that each complaint must be thoroughly investigated. Many involve complex allega-tions and also often include mul-

tiple law enforcement agencies, he said.

As for prosecutions, he said: “Once it leaves our hands, it’s out of our jurisdiction. How they are treated by the state attorney’s office is an issue they will have to deal with.”

O’Bryant’s agency regu-lates the licenses of more than 300,000 real estate profession-als, in effect, endorsing the integ-rity and credentials of the those who handle billions of dollars of

property transactions every year in Florida.

The number of cases has soared since the real estate bub-ble burst in 2006, further stress-ing the 33 investigators stationed around the state, O’Bryant said.

“We have been overwhelmed with the number of complaints,” he said. “It’s absolutely astonish-ing to me. It’s a constant battle to keep up with.”

Whatever the reason, the time it takes to investigate allows the

bad apples to find more unsus-pecting victims.

• • •

Take the case of Miami broker Donald Charnin.

He was supposed to collect rents and security deposits and turn them over to the landlord. Instead, he was accused in Octo-ber 2007 of depositing them into his business account.

The Division of Real Estate requested his financial records,

but he did not cooperate. The probe dragged on. Charnin kept collecting security deposits from more tenants without paying his clients, according to state records.

The state eventually finished the investigation into the original case in August 2009 and revoked his license two months later.

Two years had lapsed. The damage: six more complaints and $6,340 lost. And no criminal charges.

Carrie Taylor, a South Flor-ida mother who needed a rental home, knows what it’s like to be ripped off by a real estate agent.

In October 2008, she gave $975 to a Miami broker, who failed to pass it along to the land-lord. Instead the agent kept it for herself. Taylor later found out the agent had done it before, pocket-ing $2,300 in rent intended for another landlord, who had also filed a complaint.

Taylor said her efforts to col-lect the money failed. She had to come up with the rent money again.

“I even tried finding her myself,” she said. “I never heard another thing from anyone. She really hurt my family.”

Consumers like Taylor have few good options when trying to recoup money in disputes with real estate professionals. They can file a lawsuit, but that means lawyers and court fees. They can go to the police, but officers rarely investigate contract dis-putes.

The last alternative is to file a complaint with the Division of Real Estate. The investigation is administrative, not criminal. The punishment can range from a fine to license revocation.

In most cases, investigators have six months to complete inquiries after receiving com-plaints. They then notify pros-ecutors after their probe and before sending the case to the department’s legal unit. The attorneys can request additional evidence or forward the case to a probable cause panel .

The accused are given time to respond and appear for adminis-trative hearings. If an individual is found to have violated state statutes, a final order might not come for another six months or longer.

The state can bypass that pro-cess and immediately suspend a license if the public is at risk, but that is rarely done. Just six emer-gency orders have been issued since 2008.

Two occurred after police arrested a broker and an appraiser in connection with murders, and two others for sex-ually assaulting teenage girls. Another came after an agent

stole items from a home. Those five were charged crim-

inally.But sometimes even an emer-

gency order — one in which reg-ulators described the broker as having “a total disregard for the laws and regulations . . . of this state” — doesn’t assure criminal prosecution.

• • •

Tampa broker Horace Gerald Reynolds Jr. admitted in 2010 to misusing more than $120,000 to keep his business running. He decided to kill himself so his mother could use his life insur-ance to repay the accounts.

“I never should have taken this route,” he wrote in a typed suicide note to his mother. “And there is no excuse for what I did. I am so sorry. I feel like I have let everyone down.”

His suicide attempt on Jan. 27, 2010, failed.

State auditors found that Reynolds misused at least $128,445. Charlie Liem, the act-ing secretary of the Department of Business and Professional Regulation, the parent agency of the Division of Real Estate, called it “theft of funds.”

Liem believed Reynolds posed a danger to property owners.

“Mr. Reynolds’ conduct consti-tutes such a threat to the public’s safety and total disregard for the laws and regulations governing real estate professionals in this state that the safety and security of Florida residents cannot be assured as long as Mr. Reynolds continues the practice of real estate,” Liem wrote in his emer-gency suspension order.

Reynolds then surrendered his license.

But he avoided prosecution.There was no evidence to show

that Reynolds personally bene-fited from his actions, said Hills-borough State Attorney’s Office spokesman Mark Cox. The dots, he said, are easier to connect in certain criminal cases.

“It’s not like he committed a murder or raped someone or went to Vegas and bought hook-ers,” Cox said.

Sheri Maxim, the assistant state attorney who determined no charges should be filed, said Reynolds’ actions were wrong, but she could not show he stole the money. The business is the victim, she added.

A civil court file, however, lists names of victims being repaid.

Reynolds’ mother, Mary Reyn-olds, says she and her son are repaying the money. One-third of the $128,000 has been repaid, and the remaining cash should be repaid next year, she said.

She stressed that her son didn’t

From the front page > tampabay.com for the latest news

Reality limits real estate agent oversight

Photo by ALLISON DIAZ

Carrie Taylor, 36, lost $975 in rent when a Miami broker pocketed the money instead of passing it along to the landlord. The broker had done the same thing to another renter.

Miami-Dade366

Broward189

Palm Beach101

Brevard61

St. Lucie38

Orange191

Volusia68

Marion52

Pinellas64

Polk27

Leon27

Suwannee6

Alachua16

Hillsborough56

Lee140

Sarasota42

Monroe16

Escambia52

Bay32

Duval48

The Florida Division of Real Estate sent 1,595 cases to state attorneys between Jan. 1, 2009 and Dec. 31, 2010. Here's a breakdown of how many cases went to each of the state's 20 judicial circuits. Some circuits handle multiple counties.

Source: The Florida Division of Real Estate STEVE MADDEN | Times

. See REAL ESTATE, 15A

* * * * St. Petersburg Times | Sunday, February 13, 2011 | 15A

harm anyone and only juggled the money between accounts to keep the business operating.

“It’s probably going to take a year” to pay everyone, Mary Reynolds said. “We have made a huge dent.”

A few cases eventually wind up in court. But very rarely, according to the Times analysis of the 1,595 cases.

Sean Keefe, a former assistant state attorney in Hillsborough County, wasn’t surprised by the small number of prosecutions. White-collar cases are hard to prove in court, and prosecutors, he said, won’t file charges unless they are confident of winning a conviction. If an individual establishes a pattern of miscon-duct, Keefe said, the cases are much easier to prosecute.

“There’s such a massive gray area where the criminal intent began and ended,” said Keefe, who now practices with the Tampa firm of James, Hoyer, Newcomer, Smiljanich & Yan-chunis. “The government has to be convinced it can establish the case beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Cases with small amounts of money are harder to prosecute, Keefe said. Trying to differenti-ate between people making a mistake at work or committing a crime is difficult in isolated cases, he added.

Defendants know that and will invoke the “mistake defense” to argue they should be sued or even fired from a job but not prosecuted, he said.

“That can be a very good defense,” Keefe said. “It gets really, really tricky.”

John Yanchunis, a senior part-ner at the same firm as Keefe, added that a lack of resources also plays a role. The same issue came up in the late 1980s when bar associations wanted real estate professionals prosecuted in order to protect the public from fraud. But money was an issue then and even more now, he added.

“They have bigger fish to fry,” Yanchunis said. “The state attor-neys and public defenders are getting squeezed. They have less and less (funding) to hire staff.”

Cases even fall through the cracks.

A $25,000 dispute involv-ing a Clearwater broker disap-peared for 16 months until the Times started asking questions. The Division of Real Estate sent the case to the Brevard-Semi-nole State Attorney’s Office in September 2009, records show. That office had no record of the case last month when the news-paper requested the status. The division admitted it erred by sending the case to the wrong state attorney’s office. It recently forwarded the case to the Pinel-las-Pasco State Attorney’s Office.

“We made a mistake,” said state spokeswoman Sandi Copes.

• • •

Patricia Fitzgerald, president of the Florida Realtors, won-ders if the system is broken. She was surprised to hear about the backlog of cases and the lengthy investigations.

Dishonest Realtors tarnish the reputations of thousands of hard workers in Florida, she said.

“There seems to be a need for a little swifter justice,” Fitzger-ald said. “This is an area that needs to be shored up. It sounds like something is getting lost in the sauce.”

Chip Boring, a Realtor and member of the Real Estate Com-mission, said the investigative process takes time to be done properly. He preferred a cau-tious approach before taking away someone’s license or going forward with a criminal prose-cution.

“We’re not perfect in our prac-tices,” he said. “We all make mis-takes, and it may not be inten-tional.”

Fasano wants justice. While he lamented how long the investigations took, he was even more concerned about consum-ers being defrauded and deceit-ful real estate professionals avoiding prosecution.

“Anytime you defraud some-one, you should be charged with a crime,” Fasano said. “That’s wrong.”

Times researcher Carolyn Edds contributed to this report. Mark Puente can be reached at mpuente@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8459. Follow him at Twitter at twitter.com/markapuente.

The results of 1,595 Florida Division of Real Estate investigations between Jan. 1, 2009 and Dec. 31, 2010.

No discipline or remainsopen53%

Revokelicense18%

Probation13%

Suspension 9%

Fine 4%

Reprimand 2%

Restrictions 1%

From the front page >

. REAL ESTATE continued from 14A

The length of time it took theDivision of Real Estate to investigate the 1,595 cases.

40177

616

242

520

3 yearsor more

2-3years

1-2 years

1 year or less

Open

0 2 4 6 8

’02-03

’03-04

’04-05

’05-06

’06-07

’07-08

’08-09

’09-10

The number of complaints filed with the Florida Division of Real Estate peaked during the housing collapse.

Source: The Florida Division of Real Estate Times

5,046

5,763

5,883

6,376

6,658

8,590

7,345

6,268

Associated Press

NEW YORK — A man who went on a 28-hour stabbing rampage that took the lives of his stepfather, his ex-girlfriend and her mother was arrested Saturday at a subway stop in Times Square after a night-long manhunt across New York City, police said.

Maksim Gelman, 23, of Brook-l y n a l s o hijacked a car, stab-b ing and wounding the driver and fatally h i tt ing a pedestrian, authorities said.

Gelman was apprehended at 8:30 a.m. in the subway sta-tion, said chief NYPD spokes-man Paul Browne. Minutes earlier, a man was stabbed and wounded on a crowded No. 3 train in Manhattan.

Gelman’s stepfather, Alek-sandr Kuznetsov, 54, was stabbed numerous times about 5 a.m. Friday, authori-ties said. Police found his body at his home in Brooklyn’s Sheepshead Bay.

Friday afternoon, police got another 911 call reporting a stabbing a few blocks away. At the scene, officers discov-ered the bodies of Gelman’s girlfriend, Yelena Bulchenko, 20, and her mother, Anna Bulchenko, 56.

Police say Gelman escaped in a Lexus he had stolen. He then carjacked another vehicle and stabbed the driver before hitting the pedestrian, who later died at a hospital. The driver was in stable condition.

The New York Post reported that the violence started after Gelman flew into a rage because his stepfather refused to let him drive the Lexus.

Charges were pending against Gelman.

4 dead in New York rampage

Nation >

Gelman

FL60982

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