Flickr/<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/49524453@N05/4812880170/">Greene4Florida</a>
It’s been a bruising week for Jeff Greene, the billionaire “populist” running for US Senate in Florida. Greene, you’ll remember, has quite the backstory: He made millions betting against the housing market before the subprime debacle; Mike Tyson was the best man at Greene’s wedding; and his circle of friends and acquaintances has included celebrities like Heidi Fleiss and Lindsay Lohan. Earlier this week, the Associated Press reported on what appears to be a classic case of pay-to-play involving Greene and a member of the Democratic National Committee, Jon Ausman of Tallahassee, who endorsed Greene.
Now comes news that the next biggest threat to barrier reefs after global warming is, well, Jeff Greene’s three-story, 145-foot yacht Summerwind. The St. Pete Times reports today that, five years ago, Greene’s yacht dropped anchor onto one of the planet’s most treasured barrier reefs off the coast of Belize. (Greene wasn’t aboard at the time.) According to Belize environmental officials, the case remains open, and Greene or Summerwind‘s captain at the time of the incident face fines of up to $1.9 million if they ever return to that country. If they don’t, then there’s nothing Belize officials can do.
Greene’s campaign denied to the Times that the reef incident ever occurred, even though Belize officials have a two-volume case file containing evidence of the episode. “Jeff Greene doesn’t take a penny of special interest money, so career politicians are attacking him with ridiculous stories about something that didn’t even happen five years ago on a boat he wasn’t even on,” a campaign spokesman told the Times. “That’s our position. That’s our quote.”
