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 A federal jury last week acquitted Miami Lakes Mayor Michael Pizzi
on one count of conspiracy to commit extortion and four counts of
accepting bribes.
Pizzi was suspended from his post in August 2013 when he was
indicted. Florida Governor Rick Scott last week refused to reinstate
him following his exoneration.
Scott said that sitting Mayor Wayne Slaton, who was elected to
replace the suspended mayor in October 2013, should serve out the
remainder of Pizzi’s term, citing a provision in the Miami Lakes
town charter that limits return of public officials to office.
 Pizzi, however, contended that he was suspended under the state’s
constitution, which allows him to return to office following his
acquittal.
Florida law does allow public officials cleared of charges to
reassume office. In 2011 Scott reinstated a suspended City of Miami
commissioner who indicted on public corruption charges and then
cleared.
“I’m going to ask my attorneys to go to court this week and get a
court order ordering the staff to respect me as the mayor,” Pizzi
said during a town hall visit on Monday.
But Slaton, a town founder and former mayor, said during a rival
town hall press conference he also wouldn’t budge.
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“The town is moving forward,” he said on Monday. “We are taking care
of business.”
During his trial, prosecutors said Pizzi accepted thousands of
dollars from undercover FBI agents posing as representatives of a
Chicago consulting firm. Pizzi’s lawyer, Benedict Kuehne, argued he
had been entrapped.
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