Casino bartender, jailed during coronavirus crisis, gets felony charge over $36 in drinks

Prosecutors won’t drop the case of a Miccosukee casino bartender jailed for allegedly undercharging $36.41 in drinks during the early days of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office on Friday formally charged Jaime Rodriguez, 50, on a felony charge of theft of personal property by a hotel employee. Rodriguez had earlier told the Miami Herald that the undercharging was a simple mistake caused by his worries about working at the hotel bar during the viral outbreak.

He pleaded not guilty through his lawyer, Saam Zangeneh, who lashed out at prosecutors. He said he twice reached out to the “intake” prosecutor to discuss why the case should not be filed and never heard back.

“In my 20 years of practice, I have never seen such a miscarriage of justice,” Zangeneh said. “Even when you take the facts that they allege as true, this doesn’t rise to the threshold of probable cause for a crime.“

Third-degree felonies are punishable by up to five years in prison, although Rodriguez does not have a criminal past and would likely not get a maximum punishment.

A Miami-Dade State Attorney’s spokesman said the office would have “preferred” that the prosecutor and defense lawyer had spoken about the case before the filing. But because most lawyers are working from home, the “current pressures of remote felony case review can make this type of conferring difficult,” spokesman Ed Griffith said.

“This case will undergo further review and discussion with defense counsel in the hope of coming to an appropriate resolution,” he said.

The incident happened at 4 a.m. on March 18, during a week in which casinos, restaurants and other public gathering spaces had already shut down to curb the spread of the highly contagious respiratory virus. The tribe, which is a sovereign nation and not subject to county orders, had come under criticism for refusing to close its hotel and slot machines.

Rodriguez was arrested on March 20, after tribal police said casino security officers noted on surveillance video that Rodriguez had failed to charge a customers several times.

“It was a mistake, I didn’t mean to not charge,” Rodriguez told the Miami Herald. “With everything going on, with the coronavirus, I was distracted.”

Rodriguez spent several hours in jail before posting bond. By that point, police departments across South Florida were cutting back on arrests for minor crimes, as a way to cut back on the jail population and keep distance from the citizens who may be infected by the highly contagious respiratory virus.

The Miccosukee Resort & Gaming, 500 SW 177th Ave,. shut down its slot-machine rooms on March 21, a day after the arrest. The tribe, in a statement issued Friday night, said employees have stolen more than $5 million from the casino in recent years.

“The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida places great trust in the employees they hire to assist in running their business concerns, including those at Miccosukee Resort & Gaming,” the statement said. “While the Tribe does not make decisions on who eventually gets prosecuted, the Tribe does have a zero tolerance policy for theft by employees.”

The tribe also said it is trying to “also painstakingly seek out ways to maintain pay and benefits to their over one thousand full-time employees while they are home remaining safe.”

This story was originally published April 17, 2020 at 11:48 AM.