The former manager of the defunct agency that oversaw Florida's five private prisons has been indicted on fraud and money-laundering charges involving nearly $225,000 in state funds.
Prominent lobbyist Alan Duffee declined comment on the six-count indictment announced Wednesday by U.S. Attorney Gregory Miller and Florida Department of Law Enforcement Commissioner Guy Tunnell.
Duffee said he could not discuss the situation before meeting with his attorney, Stephen Dobson. Dobson said Wednesday night he would have to study the six-count indictment before commenting.
Duffee, president of The Windsor Group lobbying firm, was executive director of the Correctional Privatization Commission from May of 2002 until June of last year, when the Legislature voted to abolish the five-member panel and put the Department of Management Services in charge of administering its contracts. In a blistering audit unrelated to Duffee, the DMS inspector general last month issued a report saying the state had overpaid two prison-management companies, GEO Group and Corrections Corp. of America, by nearly $13 million - including salaries of officers that didn't exist.

The indictment, which presents only the prosecution side and is not evidence at trial, involved money from a major maintenance-and-repair fund the state required GEO and Corrections Corp. of America to maintain, for replacing or fixing equipment costing more than $5,000 that breaks down at the prisons.
The indictment alleged that Duffee set up a bank account at People's First Bank of Tallahassee in the Correctional Privatization Commission's name - without knowledge of the five commissioners - and made himself the sole signatory on the account. It said he directed the Wachovia Bank in Jacksonville to move $224,972.92 in checks and wire transfers from the repair-and-maintenance fund to the People's First account.
The Wachovia fund was made up of a percentage of monthly payments the Department of Corrections made to the companies operating the privately run prisons. The two companies operate prisons in Bay and Gadsden counties and at Lake City, South Bay and Moore Haven.
The indictment did not allege that the companies, DMS or the Department of Corrections did anything wrong. It said Duffee "did knowingly and willfully devise ... a scheme and artifice to defraud, and to obtain money and property" illegally from the prison-maintenance fund.
It said Duffee converted the money "to his personal use and to the use of others not entitled thereto by making cash withdrawals, paying personal debts, purchasing real and personal property, and otherwise expending these funds for purposes unauthorized and wholly unrelated to the business of the CPC."
It listed three wire transfers totaling $174,972.92 in 2003. The indictment said Duffee also used United Parcel Service to deliver checks totaling $50,000 to the Correctional Privatization Commission account he had set up.
Two other counts said Duffee withdrew cashier's checks from the People's First account for $27,597.93 on May 13, 2003, and for $73,117.51 on May 30 of that year.
In addition to the criminal penalties, which FDLE said could add up to 20 years and fines of $250,000 on all counts, the indictment sought forfeiture of real estate and a car owned by Duffee and recovery of the money.