According to his confession letter, Greenberg called Gaetz with bad news.
Greenberg claimed that both men paid to have sex with a teenager. According to two sources, a cooperating witness was in Greenberg's office when the call took place.
The witness, Big Joe, his best friend and an employee at the tax office, recently pleaded guilty to fraud and drug charges.
According to two people briefed on the matter, Greenberg was present for the call that he made to Gaetz on Sept. 4. They said that the call was short and Gaetz ended it.
Wingman says that Gaetz paid for sex with a minor.
The sources did not know if Ellicott had discussed the call with investigators, but his account would likely be of critical interest since it would match a key claim Greenberg made separately in a confession letter. The Daily Beast previously reported that the letter was in the hands of federal agents.
In the letter, which Greenberg wrote after his indictment in late 2020 as part of an effort to land a presidential pardon, the tax official claimed that he, Gaetz, and others had sex with a minor they believed to be 19 at the time. He wrote that he received an anonymous tip that she was under the age of 18. He used to be a local tax collector and had access to the Florida state drivers license database.
Greenberg wrote in a handwritten draft of the letter that he warned Gaetz to stay away from the person because she was under the age of 18.
He said there was no further contact with this individual until after her 18th birthday.
Greenberg's sworn plea agreement with the federal government had the same date as The Daily Beast's report. The agreement also provided a damning additional detail; it included a timestamp of when Greenberg accessed the database to look up the girl's age.
The two pieces of information would be tied together by Ellicott.
If investigators have Greenberg's phone records, they could confirm whether he made the alleged call. The records wouldn't reveal what was said. It was possible for Ellicott to confirm that Greenberg had warned Gaetz, who was first elected to Congress less than a year prior. Federal agents took the Republican's phone around December 2020.
Circle Pleads Guilty to Florida Shock Jock.
Attorneys for Ellicott didn't comment on Wednesday. Gaetz's office did not answer questions about the congressman's recollection of the phone call, instead repeating a statement it has issued before. We are focused on representing Floridians.
Greenberg had a friend group. The former sports radio shock jock turned pawn shop proprietor was never close with Gaetz, though they attended some of the same parties around the time period in question, according to numerous people familiar with them.
Gaetz has said that he never had sex with an under age girl. It would suggest that Gaetz was aware that he had a sexual relationship with a seventeen year old.
The claim would cast doubt on Gaetz's protestations that he was unaware of the accusations when The New York Times first reported them in March 2021. He confirmed the investigation.
The Daily Beast reported that eight months after Greenberg warned Gaetz to steer clear of the teen, the congressman wrote in one of the back-to-back payments.
The girl was five months past her 18th birthday. Gaetz was 36 years old that week.
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