The credit card charges, including plane tickets for his family to Europe and copious cups of Starbucks, were revealed last week as part of the criminal case against Sansom.
That led to an anonymous IRS complaint
alleging Sansom violated law by not declaring the income. But the
agency was already looking at Sansom, according to a person close to
the inquiry. An IRS spokesman would neither confirm nor deny an
investigation, as is customary.
In a previous report, we noted that during the time Sansom was spending party money, Jay Odom contributed about $279,000 to the Republican Party of Florida.
Turns out, he gave much more than that.
One
of Odom's corporations, Anchors Street, gave $100,000 on March 6, 2007
and his Crystal Beach Development gave $10,000 on June 16, 2008,
according to Division of Elections records.
Sansom appears to
have gotten the card in November 2006, when he took over the House
election effort. Prior to that, Anchors Street gave $100,000 in four
sums from February 2006 to June 2006. And another $92,500 came in from
Crystal Beach Development, Jaco L.C. and 99 Eglin LTD.
State
Attorney Willie Meggs, who convened the grand jury that indicted Sansom
on official misconduct and perjury charges for getting $6 million in
taxpayer money for an airport building Odom would allegedly use, has
not said why he subpoenaed the American Express statements. But it's
likely he would try to paint a correlation between Sansom's spending
and legislative favors.
Sansom's trial is scheduled to begin Sept. 29. Several motions to dismiss will be heard next Wednesday in Tallahassee.
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