ORLANDO, Fla. — The man accused of accepting a bribe from ex-lawmaker Frank Artiles in exchange for putting his name on the ballot in a South Florida legislative race last year plans to accept a plea deal and testify as a witness against Artiles, prosecutors said Thursday during a hearing.
Prosecutors allege Artiles, a former state senator, paid Alex Rodriguez nearly $45,000 to file to run as an independent candidate in a hotly contested Miami-area state Senate race in an attempt to confuse voters and siphon votes from the Democratic incumbent.
Rodriguez, who is scheduled to enter his plea agreement Tuesday, is expected to serve as a witness for the state during Artiles’ trial, said Tim VanderGiesen, a public-corruption prosecutor in the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office.
The trial, which was slated to begin Aug. 30, has been postponed. Judge Andrea Wolfson granted a 60-day continuance on Thursday.
Despite doing no campaigning, Rodriguez received more than 6,000 votes in the Florida Senate District 37 race, which Republican Ileana Garcia won by just 32 votes. Rodriguez had the same last name as the Democratic incumbent, Jose Javier Rodriguez.
Rodriguez was one of three so-called “ghost” candidates who filed to run in key Florida Senate races last year, including Senate District 9 in central Florida. Though none of them actively campaigned, all were supported by ads worded to appeal to left-leaning voters, which were funded by the same dark-money donor.
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