A longtime federal fugitive who was an undocumented immigrant cost taxpayers more than $350,000 in healthcare at Miami-Dade hospitals before he died last year, a county investigative report has revealed. The Miami-Dade Office of the Inspector General said the patient was a Colombian who fled the United States in 1983 after a cocaine smuggling conviction but returned under a false name. In 26 visits to the Jackson Health System from 2003 through 2010, his care cost $201,716 — $155,334 in charity care paid by Miami-Dade taxpayers and $46,382 paid by Medicaid, the state-federal program for the poor. The man also ran up $163,734 in bills from other healthcare providers that were paid by Medicaid. (Source: Miami Herald) Note: When you question the status of a possible illegal alien online with the Ocala Star Banner, the online editor will promptly remove comments and scold anyone for asking the question. At least the Herald has the guts to write real stories about the real costs of illegal aliens.

Senate Democratic Leader Nan Rich said Tuesday she is seriously considering a 2014 run for governor. In an interview with the News Service of Florida, Rich said Gov. Rick Scott's priorities have been made clear by the budget he proposed and the one he signed - and that she thinks most Floridians don't share his priorities.

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It pays well to be employed at the Hillsborough County School Board:

When drug dealers started disappearing from street corners earlier this year, Tampa police detectives thought something was going on. And when officers made traffic stops, they began noticing something odd. They were finding "massive amounts" of preloaded debit cards, along with ledgers and laptop computers, said Sgt. Terry Goff in an exclusive interview with The Tampa Tribune and News Channel 8. They soon uncovered what Goff said was an explosion of tax fraud that permeated the city's poorest neighborhoods and some of its most influential conclaves. Erstwhile street criminals were now using laptops and mailboxes to steal hundreds of millions of dollars by filing fraudulent tax returns with stolen Social Security numbers. Investigators believe Tampa is at the tip of a national trend that has created a hemorrhage of federal tax dollars. In a six-month period, Postal Inspector Doug Smith said his agents seized an estimated $100 million in fraudulent tax refunds destined for local mailboxes. And Police Chief Jane Castor said she thinks that number represents less than 10 percent of the total fraud. If Castor's estimate is close, the total fraud in the Tampa area alone could approach $1 billion.

The state agency's Inspector General delved into the Tampa Bay agency's expenditures in November 2009 following an 8 On Your Side investigation that revealed the local nonprofit spent thousands of taxpayer money on food, parties and entertainment. The Tampa Bay agency receives millions of federal dollars to help the jobless find work and retrain the unemployed for new positions. The inspector general's investigation found the alliance spent $147,000 on unallowable expenses.