Sex-trafficking victims testimony continues to impact powerful Florida men

MIAMI – Federal inmate records show Joel Greenberg, the former tax collector for Seminole County, remained at the Federal Correctional Institution Sunday in Downtown Miami, and he is not set to get out until July 16, 2030.

New federal court filings recently cited by NOTUS reported a 17-year-old girl was at a July 15, 2017 party that former Florida Rep. Chris Dortworth, also a former lobbyist, was allegedly hosting in Heathrow, Fla., and Greenberg and U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz attended.

The Orlando Sentinel reported Friday that Dorworth claims that he was not at the party where witnesses, including the teenage girl, who is now a 25-year-old witness, reported there was cocaine, molly, and sex workers. Prosecutors decided not to charge Gaetz.

A federal judge sentenced Greenberg to 11 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to identity theft, stalking, wire fraud, conspiracy to bribe a public official, and child sex trafficking.

In June, the House Ethics Committee announced a review of allegations that “Gaetz may have: engaged in sexual misconduct and illicit drug use, accepted improper gifts, dispensed special privileges and favors to individuals with whom he had a personal relationship, and sought to obstruct government investigations of his conduct.”

The committee also announced there was no longer an investigation into allegations that Gaetz “shared inappropriate images or videos on the House floor, misused state identification records, converted campaign funds to personal use, and/or accepted a bribe or improper gratuity.”

In response, Gaetz wrote on X: “The House Ethics Committee has closed four probes into me, which emerged from lies intended solely to smear me.

“Instead of working with me to ban Congressional stock trading, the Ethics Committee is now opening new frivolous investigations. They are doing this to avoid the obvious fact that every investigation into me ends the same way: my exoneration.”