WHEN IT RAINS, IT POURS...AND ACCEPTING THE BLAME

There's blood in the water, and the Florida press is swarming around former Florida Democratic Party chairman and present gubernatorial candidate Scott Maddox.

Here's the latest news.

The Maddox campaign released a letter Tuesday from his friend, FDP Controller and Leon County Democratic Party Treasurer Debbie Griffin-Bruton, acknowledging that due to personal and professional stress she did not tell Maddox of the financial problems on both the state and county level. Maddox also served as Leon County party chairman.

The result was a lien being placed by the Internal Revenue Service on the state party for failing to pay withholding and Social Security taxes taken out of employees' paychecks, and a $10,500 fine by the Leon County Supervisor of Elections office against the local party for submitting a campaign financial statement three weeks late.

In the letter, Griffin-Bruton said that the work was more that she had expected, and that her husband had been diagnoised with early-onset Alzheimer's disease. Saying that her spouse's care had placed a drain on her time and resources, Griffin-Bruton eventually placed him in a long term care facility. She also said in the letter that she would resign her positions as state party comptroller and Leon County party treasurer at the end of this month...which is tomorrow.

The Brutons have been friends with Maddox for a number of years. Debbie Griffin-Bruton worked for Maddox as financial director of Tallahassee's Parks and Recreation Department while he was mayor, and he brought her onto the state party staff when he became chairman. She lives in her home, which she and her husband sold to Maddox's Spectrum Resources nearly three years ago. Maddox had allowed them to stay paying only a modest rent, which was waived completely after John Bruton's placement into long-term care.

The home figures into today's additional bit:

Maddox, who owns a number of investment properties around Tallahassee through his Spectrum Resources firm, apparantly did not update his mailing address when he moved into a new home last year. The result: An overdue tax bill on Griffin-Bruton's home of $2,632.47. Maddox told the Tallahassee Democrat that the bill was paid Monday, which I4J confirmed with an online search on the Leon County Tax Collector's site. He apparantly had one other piece of property on which the taxes were deliquent under his own name, but was paid in February. His other properties are apparantly in order with the Leon County tax office.