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This is the seventh and final installment of a seven-part investigative series into Broward County Sheriff Gregory Tony, a man who built his career on lies, violence, and manipulation. The series charts Tony’s misdeeds from the streets of Philadelphia to the most powerful political office in South Florida.
PART SEVEN
“This death is on my watch. It’s on my watch.” – Sheriff Gregory Tony, February 19, 2025
Greg Tony has felt the heat in recent months. On February 16, Nathan Gingles was charged with murdering his estranged wife, Mary, her father, and a neighbor in Tamarac. Previously, Gingles had been accused of stalking Mary. She made thirteen 9-1-1 calls to BSO in the past year, with issues ranging from custody to child abuse. A restraining order had been issued against Nathan.
Two months before the murders, Mary again called 9-1-1 and told responding deputies that Nathan had been entering her house when she wasn’t home, despite the unwanted visits being an infraction in their divorce proceedings. She was afraid he was going to kill her. Despite this and numerous past issues, Nathan was not arrested. Mary filed a restraining order. Unlike a previous order that stripped him of his weapons, he was allowed to keep guns, ammunition, and silencers. It would be a fatal mistake. Following the murders, eight deputies were suspended.
“There will be people who will lose their job(s) over this,” Greg Tony said. He called the performance of his deputies “piss poor” and additionally said their lack of action amounted to “bullshit work.”
The “piss-poor,” “bullshit work” of deputies under Tony’s command should give Governor DeSantis pause. The unending 9-1-1 calls and accusations of non-action by BSO deputies mirror what led Nikolas Cruz to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on February 14, 2018.
The incompetence doesn’t stop there. There is good reason to believe Jemeriah Cooper, the Tamarac district captain at the time of the incident, should never have been assigned to the city. After the murders, Tony removed Cooper from his post and demoted him to the position of deputy. Cooper was subsequently fired from the agency for “failure to meet probationary standards.” Yet, the damage had been done.
Cooper was appointed to the district on April 8, 2023. The designation was made official at a Tamarac Commission Meeting on April 12th.
“First, I would like to say thank you to our sheriff, Gregory Tony, for promoting me to captain,” Cooper said at the meeting.
He also thanked City Manager Levent Sucuoglu for appointing him the district captain. According to the City of Tamarac’s contract with BSO, when a district captain position becomes vacant, the process of appointing a new captain is “initiated by BSO selecting three (3) qualified candidates for the position of District Chief.”
The sheriff can weigh in on the decision at any time. BSO can also remove the district captain due to demotion, discipline, or if the sheriff has lost confidence in them. But the sheriff did not weigh in. He had nothing but confidence in Jemeriah Cooper. Tony promoted Cooper from sergeant to lieutenant in 2019, to second-in-command, executive officer of the Tamarac in 2021, and to captain in 2023.
Yet, as Cooper rose through the ranks, voices within BSO began to speak up. Just before his initial promotion to lieutenant, a female deputy, a direct subordinate of Cooper, filed an internal affairs complaint. She alleged that for a year, Cooper made inappropriate comments toward her and three other deputies. She said Cooper made comments about her butt and asked inappropriate questions about her personal life.
The deputy spoke up because of Cooper’s impending promotion, concerned that even more power and authority might affect other women under his command. Investigators contacted a second female deputy. She told them that, in addition to extremely unprofessional comments, Cooper also showed her a video of two women having sex. When investigators asked if she would like to file a formal complaint, the deputy began to cry. She declined, fearing retaliation from the “higher ups.”
A third female deputy claimed Cooper showed her a video of women having sex, made crude comments, and asked her many times to have lunch with him alone.
“…he’s my superior, so I had to brush it off,” she told the investigators.
The investigation was closed. The multiple allegations of sexual harassment were not sustained. Oddly, it was also concluded that Cooper’s actions “discredited himself and the Broward Sheriff’s Office.”
His discipline was counseling and training. And despite the credible accusations, he was rewarded with multiple promotions.
It’s hard to believe that Tony was unaware of the investigation or the litany of accusations. If he did know and looked the other way, it would be equally damning. Tony eventually acted against Cooper, but it was not until something went horribly wrong.
Tony’s decision to repeatedly promote Cooper despite harassment allegations reveals a public official who prioritizes personal loyalty over professional competence—the same mindset that left Mary Gingles vulnerable.
As Tony’s leadership failures became exposed due to the Tamarac incident, he still seemed more concerned about flashy displays of power. In a move that would make a dictator jealous, just two weeks after suspending and demoting his deputies, Tony had one more surprise for his constituents—gaudy green rings for his executive command staff. Each of the seven pieces of oversized jewelry resembling Super Bowl rings had an emerald green backdrop and was topped with a sheriff’s star.
“I am honored to present each of my Executive Directors with a BSO Command Ring – a symbol of the victories we achieved together,” Tony said on a personal Instagram post. “Just like championship rings in sports, these represent our collective hard work, dedication and commitment to excellence.”
Tony publicly claimed no taxpayer funds were used to purchase these physical symbols of loyalty to the throne. Yet, the Florida Bulldog’s public records request to find out who actually paid for the jewelry went unanswered. Whether it was donors, contractors, or political allies, someone paid to make Gregory Tony look like a king.
Tony subsequently fired or suspended six additional deputies due to the Tamarac incident. Since the tragedy, at least 15 deputies have been suspended without pay or fired. This prompted the BSO deputies and sergeants’ union to file a grievance against BSO’s leadership in defense of 5 of the suspended deputies.
The grievance states that the deputies “had little to no involvement with any portion of this case. Therefore, it begs the question as to how BSO could breach the collective bargaining agreement in such an egregious manner when the action is so diametrically opposed to the facts of the situation, especially when those facts, according to the procedures that must be followed, have not yet even been determined by BSO.”
Many BSO officials have been punished in the wake of the incident, yet one remains untouched. Greg Tony has been judge, jury, and executioner, without evidence or due process, to purge the department of perceived bad employees.
Governor DeSantis issued Executive Order 19-14, suspending then-Sheriff Scott Israel. Two constitutional charges were levied against Israel: “Neglect of Duty” and “Incompetence.”
To use the past as precedent, the Tamarac incident and its tasteless aftermath should be reason alone for Governor DeSantis to remove Tony. The governor took swift action against Sheriff Israel after the MSD shooting tragedy. Yet he remains conspicuously silent on Tony’s more extensive failures, illustrating how political calculations often precede public safety.
This selective enforcement by Governor DeSantis creates a system where politicians like Tony can operate with impunity until their actions become politically inconvenient to those with the power to remove them.
Tony’s very recent vitriolic attacks are not only directed at his department. Two weeks ago, he accused the Broward State Attorney’s Office of corruption after three BSO detention deputies were taken into custody on a warrant issued by the state attorney’s investigator. The three deputies stand accused of battery, including physical violence, deployment of pepper spray and use of a taser on a female inmate. It is alleged that the deputies dragged the inmate into a blind spot to assault her more aggressively.
Tony defended the deputies, reinstated them to full duty, and claimed the decision to charge them was “Public corruption and favors for friends.” Tony also suggested that the inmate received preferential treatment from prosecutors because of who she knows.
The Broward State Attorney, Harold Pryor, denied all assertions, saying, “attempts to bully my office or sway public opinion prior to trial will not deter us from seeking justice or striving to do the right thing.”
CONCLUSION
Greg Tony can be compared to Frank Abagnale, the enigmatic con man who built a career on lies. Abagnale pretended to be a Pan Am pilot, a pediatric supervising doctor and a lawyer. He charmed everyone he met, lied to their faces, and swindled them. And, it worked… for a time.
Like Abagnale, Tony has demonstrated a remarkable ability to reinvent himself. He transformed from a troubled teenager to the sheriff of Florida's second-most populous county despite a fabricated history and resume. Like Abagnale, Tony used deception and lawlessness to climb the ladder of success.
Abagnale, of course, did not shoot his unarmed friend to death in the street in broad daylight. And, he was eventually caught.
Even though Tony’s lies have been exposed and his present schemes, hijinks, and mishaps continue to embarrass the governor, DeSantis has not removed the embattled sheriff. The governor has taken action against many more for far less, but admitting that appointing Tony was a mistake would also be acknowledging that he was wrong.
Tony lied to Governor DeSantis about killing his friend, first omitting the story from his background, then claiming it was self-defense. He didn’t tell the governor about several driving infractions and court appointments. He didn’t admit to being rejected by one law enforcement agency and lying to get into another. Independent state agencies have found probable cause for serious violations and made recommendations that could have led to Tony’s removal. Yet, Governor DeSantis refuses to act, speaking glowingly of the sheriff when asked about him. This is how democratic institutions decay—not by dramatic collapse, but through the quiet erosion of political principle and standards.
And Tony continues to thumb his nose at the governor. But it may be starting to catch up with him. In March, at an immigration forum with Trump border czar, Tom Homan, Governor DeSantis remarked that he would not hesitate to suspend public officials who did not cooperate with and assist federal immigration authorities. On many occasions, Tony said he would not
comply with the immigration mandate, most recently at a county budget workshop, where Tony noted immigration violations were not BSO’s priority.
The governor stood by his words, and shortly after Tony’s statement, Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sent a powerful message to the sheriff: Publicly clarify your remarks or face the consequences. Uthmeier is DeSantis’s former chief of staff and was appointed attorney general by the governor earlier this year. He added that his office will go to any length to protect public safety and would move against Tony, with actions including “being held in contempt, or removal from office by the Governor…”
Tony, who previously labeled himself unshakable, unbreakable, and unconquerable, buckled. He issued a clarifying letter to the attorney general, promising him that BSO aligned with the governor’s immigration plan. Tony then set his anger on an easier target. When the media asked him about his expeditious about-face, he refused to answer any questions, instead issuing a scathing social media diatribe. Backed into a corner, Tony apologized and shifted blame to a reliable scapegoat: local television stations and newspapers.
Tony’s swift capitulation when faced with real consequences reveals the hollow core beneath his constructed façade. After years of evading accountability and attributing his success to hard work and an indestructible persona, the sheriff crumbled at the first sign of a genuine threat to his power. The question is no longer whether Tony will face consequences, but whether the governor will finally choose what’s right over political convenience. Hopefully, it is sooner rather than later for the good of Broward County.
