Miami defense attorney David Macey surrenders to feds in case tied to DEA bribery scheme
A Coral Gables criminal defense lawyer surrendered to U.S. authorities in New York on Friday after he was indicted on charges of bribing a veteran federal agent in a scheme to obtain confidential information about drug-trafficking suspects to recruit them as potential clients for his law firm.
David Macey, 54, a licensed member of the Florida Bar with no prior complaints, was charged with a conspiracy to bribe Drug Enforcement Administration agent John Costanzo Jr., while using a retired DEA colleague and a Coral Gables police detective as intermediaries in the alleged corruption scheme, according to an indictment.
The indictment, returned this past week by a grand jury in the Southern District of New York, was unsealed on Friday after Macey made his first appearance in Manhattan federal court, where he pleaded not guilty and was granted a bond.
The four-count indictment accuses the lawyer of “using methods designed to conceal Macey’s own connection to the bribe payments.”
His defense attorney, David Patton, a partner with the New York law firm Hecker Fink, sent the Miami Herald a statement saying Macey “did not bribe anyone.”
“David is a devoted father and husband and a highly respected attorney with an impeccable record as a member of the bar for nearly 30 years,” Patton said in an email. “The government’s allegations are false, and we are confident that the evidence will prove his innocence at trial.”
At a 2023 trial that was a precursor to the Macey case, a Manhattan federal jury convicted Costanzo, who had worked as a supervisor in the DEA’s Miami office, and Manuel Recio, who retired from the DEA in 2018 as an assistant special agent in the Miami office, of conspiracy, bribery and other charges.
Costanzo, 51, was sentenced to four years in prison and Recio, 57, to three years in the $100,000 bribery scheme that played out in South Florida and New York between October 2018 and January 2020.
The new indictment alleges Costanzo provided Recio and Macey “with the identities of individuals who were expected to be charged in confidential grand jury proceedings, the anticipated timing of indictments and arrests, and the identities of individuals who had been arrested before information regarding those arrests became publicly available.”
In addition, longtime Coral Gables police officer Edwin Pagan III, a deputized DEA agent, was charged in November with playing a supporting role in the conspiracy to bribe Costanzo with tens of thousands of dollars for access to confidential information about drug-trafficking suspects.
The secret intelligence was then passed on to Recio, so he could share it with Macey in the scheme to recruit potential defendants as new clients, according to the indictment.
Pagan, who pleaded not guilty to bribery and conspiracy charges, was suspended from his patrol officer’s job without pay pending the outcome of an internal affairs investigation, according to the Coral Gables Police Department. As part of the corruption case, he’s also charged with perjury stemming from making “false statements” during his testimony in the federal trial that ended with the convictions of the two former DEA agents.
According to court records and trial evidence, this is how the bribery scheme unfolded in the Miami and New York City metro areas:
Upon his retirement from the DEA in November 2018, Recio began operating a Miami private investigative service, Global Legal Consulting LLC, that catered to South Florida defense attorneys and also helped them recruit clients. According to court records, Recio agreed to bribe Costanzo, who was the DEA supervisor in Miami, in exchange for his providing the private investigator with confidential information about narcotics investigations.
Costanzo gave Recio information about sealed indictments and secret investigations, including the identities of suspects and the anticipated timing of their arrests, according to court records. Costanzo also shared intelligence from the Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs Information System (NADDIS), a DEA database that contains information about targets under investigation.
Recio paid Costanzo for this information, which in turn Recio used to help recruit new clients for Macey, according to court records.
Recio paid Costanzo $2,500 in November 2018, shortly after Recio’s retirement from the DEA in Miami, records show. The payment was funneled to Costanzo through a company owned by a close family member. At the same time, Recio began asking Costanzo to run searches in the DEA database on drug-trafficking targets and investigations.
Soon after, Pagan, who has a black belt in jujitsu and runs a defense training business, JEM Solutions, entered the picture.
On Jan. 17, 2019, the Coral Gables cop, who was working as DEA task force officer, reached out to Macey, the defense attorney, by text message to attend a meeting at a Coral Gables restaurant with him, Costanzo and Recio, according to the conspiracy indictment charging Pagan and Macey.
Less than two hours before the restaurant meeting that same day, Pagan withdrew a $50,000 cashier’s check from a bank located within walking distance of the establishment, the indictment says.
The check was made out to a “close family member” of Costanzo’s — the Miami Herald has learned the recipient was his father, a retired DEA agent not charged in the bribery case. But Costanzo used the money toward a down payment on a condominium purchase, the indictment says. Costanzo then “misrepresented” the source of the $50,000 payment to his mortgage broker.
Twelve days later, on Jan. 29, 2019, Pagan and Costanzo discussed via text the creation of a shell company that Pagan “would use to funnel benefits” to Costanzo to keep the bribery scheme going, according to the indictment. On Feb. 14, 2019, Pagan established a bank account in the name of the shell company to “funnel funds” to Costanzo. That same day, Pagan sent the username and password for the shell company to Costanzo via electronic message.
According to the indictment, Recio wrote a check for $10,000 from his investigations company to the shell company in April 2019, and Recio wrote another check for $10,750 in the same manner in June 2019 — all for Costanzo’s benefit in exchange for DEA confidential information on drug-trafficking suspects.
During the course of the bribery scheme, Macey made plans to travel with Costanzo, the DEA supervisor, to New York City on April 16, 2019. It would be Macey’s treat, as he footed the bill for an expensive dinner and tickets to a New York Yankees game, according to the indictment.
Prior to the Yankees game, Macey exchanged text messages in which he told Costanzo that he had bought the tickets to the game “so that [the DEA supervisor] would not be disappointed,” the indictment says. “During the game, [Costanzo] sent electronic messages containing pictures from the Yankees game to [Recio].”
As the alleged bribery scheme continued through the summer, the indictment says, Macey and Costanzo discussed the DEA supervisor’s efforts to refer potential drug-trafficking clients to him. On June 17, 2019, Macey texted Costanzo complaining about another attorney who landed a client instead of him. Costanzo explained that the other lawyer had represented the defendant in a prior case.
On July 4, 2019, in a phone conversation, Costanzo reminded Recio that “it was necessary to work with Macey” because the lawyer was paying off the DEA supervisor, the indictment says. When Recio complained about working as a private investigator with Macey, Costanzo told him: “You gotta get through this.”
Recio then said he preferred working with another attorney, and Costanzo told him that this other lawyer “did not bring anything [bribes] to the table,” unlike Macey, the indictment says. While the indictment does not identify the other attorney, the Herald has learned his name is Luis Guerra, a longtime defense lawyer in Miami. Guerra, 61, is not being charged in the bribery case with Macey.
“As we have always maintained, Mr. Guerra never bribed anyone,” his attorney, Orlando do Campo, told the Herald on Friday. “Mr. Guerra never bribed anyone.
“The investigator [Recio] he hired was paid directly by already existing clients Mr. Guerra represented,” do Campo said. “Mr. Guerra broke no law. He never represented a client referred to him by any present or former DEA agent. We are gratified that his name has been cleared.”
This story was originally published February 13, 2025 at 3:32 PM.
