A serious mistake by the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office is that in 2022, a 17-year-old girl was accused of sex trafficking in a 27-year-old girl who discovered she was hiding in a closet with another teenager in 2022. This led to the dismissal of federal drug accusations against the doctor. .
In court last week, Camlet’s lawyer Jane Weintraub is an apparent “cut and paste” job by a human trafficking investigator for Miami-Dade Attorney Casarine Fernandez Randle. Several errors were seized when drafting the warrant. force.
The firing of federal drug charges is another stunning embarrassment for Randle, whose office has been scrutinized after years of sloppy prosecution that led to similar dismissals and the resignation of her top lawyer attorney in the firm. .
The Miami Herald failed to obtain comment from Randle or the US Lawyer’s Office.
Camlet (69), a well-known addiction doctor who deals with some of South Florida’s most prominent people, had already defeated the state’s sex trafficking case brought on by Randle in 2023 . A small river canal a few weeks before she was scheduled to testify against Camlet.
The mother of the girl who asked not to be identified because she believed her daughter had been murdered said it was a shameful police force and the prosecutors didn’t do their job.
“From the day they found her in his apartment, everything was washed under the rug,” she said.
The incident was part of a recent Miami Herald investigation. It detailed numerous errors from both Miami Beach Police Department and Randle’s offices. The story also reveals that Camlet was able to expunge three previous criminal arrests, including one for possession of cocaine, a licensed doctor who treated the patient with addiction issues. I’ve done it.
Camlet told Herald that she met two girls on the dating app Tinder. He claims they said they were 18 years old. He and his lawyers characterized two girls, 17 and another 16 as drug addicts and prostitutes who locked him in. Camlet denied that he had sex with or gave a girl’s drugs.
The 17-year-old claimed that Camlet gave her pure Colombian cocaine, and then showed her a collection of powerful weapons and dozens of pills he had kept in his safety. He then handcuffed her to his bed and had sex with her. In another incident, he showed her a porn video and told her that she could put her in porn, and later texting that he would take care of her if they had chemistry. I told her.
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She was admitted to a drug treatment facility in late 2022. When she got home, she told her mother she was going to testify against him at his upcoming trial, and that she didn’t plead with her.
“I told her, ‘Don’t do that, don’t say anything to them. Our lives are at risk here by telling the police about someone like him.” I told her that people with money and power are not in trouble. ”
Three months later, she died. Prosecutors determined her death was “undecided.” Miami-Dade Police are investigating, but there is no evidence that the probe is active.
After her death, the FBI intervened and filed a federal drug charge against Camlet based on a cache of tablets and caches of other forms of powder and liquid drugs found in his apartment. At least one of the drugs found in the safe in his condo was banned in the US
At the same time, federal prosecutors seized Camlet’s computer and told the judge that he was investigating him on child pornography charges.
Ultimately, the prosecutor was unable to overcome the flaws in the search warrant and did not file an additional claim.
“Dr. Camlet was able to demonstrate to the government that in the course of his practice he owned a controlled substance for legitimate medical purposes,” his lawyer, Weintraub, said Tuesday.
But the court filing tells a different story. Weintraub focused on the search warrant hole and the reliability of the victim.
Perhaps the worst revelation she found was that investigators were unable to remove the reference with a search warrant that had nothing to do with Kamlet’s case.
Frank Casanovas, who resigned from Randle’s office, apparently cut and pasted the language into the Camlet from another sex trafficking warrant, but did not remove any references to the institutions involved in the other cases. . For example, the Aventera Police was emphasized in this language, but Camlet’s case was not handled by the Aventera Police.
“In particular, there was no mention of Miami Beach Police, which is essential to serve as a warrant and carry out in the defendant’s speech, as it was cut and pasted,” Winetrobe wrote in her submission. .
Federal prosecutors admitted that search warrants have “many drawbacks” and called them an example of poor “draftmanship.” However, the prosecutors nevertheless argued that Casanovas was operating in good faith and that any error was merely a surveillance.
Kamlet’s arrest warrant was signed by Assistant Brenda Mezick, Rundle’s Director of Human Trafficking. It is not clear whether Mezick has registered with the search warrant.
This is not the first mistake by Rundle’s sex trafficking force. This handled another recent investigation, including allegations that a key Biscayne gymnastics coach had inappropriately touched one of his students. The unit considering the allegations refused to investigate. If they looked deeper, they would have discovered that two other students, ages 4 and 7, also filed similar complaints with the police.
Of the 638,872 criminal charges in Miami-Dade County over the past decade, the overwhelming majority (71%) have been withdrawn, abandoned or not charged, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Statewide, that figure was 39%.
Staff writer Jay Weaver contributed to this story.
