LAUDERHILL — A now-closed criminal investigation of a Lauderhill city commissioner is leading elected officials to consider whether their policies on using city-owned cars need to be more clear. Commissioner Denise Grant, who is currently running for mayor, was accused of providing false or fraudulent information to be reimbursed for a trip she took to Tallahassee in March 2023 for a nonprofit event, Youth Empowerment Village’s annual “Children’s Week,” according to the FDLE investigation. The Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office, which was assigned the case, declined to bring any charges, according to a close-out memo signed this April. The investigation centered around two key accusations, according to the FDLE report: that Grant attempted to be reimbursed for an already-paid cost of her hotel room during the trip, which totaled over $800, by altering a hotel invoice; and that she attempted to be reimbursed for $567 in mileage where she indicated she traveled in a personal car, though she traveled in a city-owned car. City employees are not allowed mileage reimbursement for travel in a city-owned car. At Monday’s commission meeting, which Grant did not attend, the commissioners and mayor voted unanimously to discuss at a public meeting next Monday whether to amend any city policies identified in the investigation and to determine whether Grant possibly violated any city policies. Tallahassee trip Grant called Tallahassee Police on March 28, 2023, to report her son was missing after they had an argument at a restaurant and he ran away. An officer responded to the restaurant and checked the car’s license plate in a law enforcement database, which then led to Lauderhill Police being notified that the car was in Tallahassee because the license plate is registered to the police department, according to the FDLE investigation. Body-worn camera video of Grant’s interaction with police showed that Grant was in the car’s driver seat and the nonprofit’s CEO was with her, the FDLE investigation said. A Lauderhill Police sergeant contacted Deputy City Manager Kennie Hobbs, to whom the car was assigned. Hobbs told Lauderhill Police the next day that Grant was authorized to take the car for a commission-related event. Grant said during her interview with FDLE that she never knew the car she drove was a city-owned car and believed that it was Hobbs’ personal car. She said she asked a “friend” to borrow the car and at first declined to say whose car it was but later said she asked Hobbs, the FDLE investigation said. “Commissioner Grant went on to state that the friend did not specify if the vehicle was a city vehicle or a personal vehicle, and she did not ask,” the FDLE investigation said. Hobbs in his statement refuted Grant’s claim that she didn’t know it was a city-owned car, according to the FDLE report. Hobbs said he told Grant it was a city car, that it was parked at City Hall where all other city-owned cars were parked, and that he left the keys for Grant at City Hall’s security desk. Grant in her FDLE statement said she previously took the same car on an out-of-state trip for her son’s soccer tournament to Tennessee the week before the Tallahassee trip, which Hobbs did not know. She returned from Tennessee on March 25, 2023, then took the car to Tallahassee on March 26, 2023, according to the FDLE investigation. She initially said she drove out of state in a personal car but later said it was the same car she took to Tallahassee. Hobbs told FDLE he would “never sanction an out of state use of a city vehicle for a personal trip,” according to the FDLE report. After the trip, Grant submitted two separate requests for reimbursements for the cost of the hotel room and for $567.50 in mileage where she indicated she used a personal car, the FDLE report said. ‘Altered’ hotel receipt Grant’s hotel room was paid for by the nonprofit, and the nonprofit’s CEO submitted a reimbursement request on April 12, 2023, for $804.92, which the city paid. A few days later, Grant submitted a request to be reimbursed for the same amount, according to the FDLE investigation. Grant emailed an invoice which “appeared to be almost identical to the invoice submitted” by the nonprofit’s CEO and “appeared to have been altered” with the top part of the document removed and only Grant’s name at the top, the FDLE investigation said. “This raised the alarm of the City Clerk’s Office of fraudulent activity,” the FDLE report said. Grant was questioned about the hotel receipt she submitted and afterward “rescinded the request for hotel reimbursement for herself,” according to the investigation. The hotel’s general manager in her statement to FDLE said the invoice Grant submitted for reimbursement “is not a style, or format, that her hotel chain uses” and that “the top portion and bottom portion were clearly altered.” Grant during her FDLE interview admitted to altering the hotel receipt and admitted that she knew the nonprofit’s CEO had also requested a reimbursement for the hotel cost, according to her statement. “Upon being shown all the forms submitted, Ms. Grant stated: ‘I… I am very sorry… but honestly, to God, as God is my witness, I did not realize that I was signing anything to be reimbursed to me,’” the FDLE investigation said. The FDLE investigator found probable cause for violations of two state statutes related to the two reimbursement requests — official misconduct and false statements, the report’s conclusion said. City Attorney Angel Petti Rosenberg said at the Monday night commission meeting that FDLE passed its investigation to the Broward State Attorney’s Office, which “announced a conflict” and then referred the case to the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office. No charges filed A close-out memo authored by Assistant State Attorney Annette Rasco said the office was declining any charges because prosecutors would not be able to prove that Grant knew the car was city-owned and not Hobbs’ personal car. Rasco wrote that Grant did not request to be reimbursed for the hotel “contrary to the complaint.” “Grant does include the hotel receipt as an attachment to the e-mail but again there is no express request for reimbursement for the hotel within the e-mail or attached forms. Grant was not reimbursed for anything relating to this travel pending investigation,” Rasco wrote. Rasco wrote that Grant admitting to taking the same car to Tennessee “speaks to Grant’s confusion as to the ownership of the vehicle” and that she did not request reimbursement for the out-of-state trip. After the investigation, Grant paid the city over $1,000 for the mileage to Tennessee and took two ethics courses from the Florida Institute of Government, the memo said, one of them titled, “Personal Empowerment: Minimizing Drama at Work.” Rasco wrote it seemed the city does not have an official process for using city vehicles because there was no documentation of Grant’s use of the car for the trip. “The vehicle did not have a yellow governmental tag, key chain with City of Lauderhill markings on it, clip board inside, or anything else to distinguish it as a city vehicle other than the fact that it was parked at City Hall. While Hobbs maintains Grant knew or should have known it was a city vehicle, absent corroborating evidence or additional evidence, the State cannot prove the case beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt,” Rasco wrote. Grant’s attorney Michael T. Davis said in a statement to the South Florida Sun Sentinel Monday night: “Commissioner Grant is in agreement with the State Attorney’s decision. With the matter resolved, she looks forward to continuing to serve her community, as she has done for the past five years.” Lauderhill Police disagreed with several points in the close-out memo and submitted a rebuttal to the State Attorney’s Office, taking issue with the prosecutor’s stance that Grant did not ask for reimbursement for the hotel and called it “inconceivable” that she didn’t know it was a city-owned car. Mayor Ken Thurston told the Sun Sentinel Monday night: “I am committed to protecting the assets of the citizens of Lauderhill, and the citizens should know that the charges are unique and there’s no other employee who’s ever been accused of doing what this commissioner is accused of doing — taking a city car and then going out of state.”
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