According to a person familiar with the matter, Mr. Greenberg and Mr. Gaetz met in Florida in 2017 through the close-knit group of prominent Trump supporters. Mr. Greenberg had no political experience prior to his election. Mr. Gaetz represents a district that is approximately 400 miles away.
Nevertheless, Mr. Greenberg and Mr. Gaetz have seen each other regularly over the past few years. They gathered at Mr. Dorworth’s in January 2019 to celebrate that Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican close to Mr. Gaetz, lifted a ban on smokable medical marijuana. The three men visited Washington together in June, and Mr Greenberg posted photos on social media of the White House lawn, including one of his daughter with Mr Gaetz and Mr Trump.
A few years ago – the exact date is unclear – Mr. Greenberg took Mr. Gaetz to the Lake Mary tax collector’s office for a weekend. The following Monday, an employee found that the alarm was disabled and the driver’s license was scattered across a desk. She checked the surveillance video and saw Mr. Greenberg at this desk with another man. When she asked Mr. Greenberg, he wrote back on text messages checked by The Times: “Yes, I showed Congressman Gaetz what our operation was like. Have i left something on? “
What the men did is unclear.
On a separate episode on a Sunday in September 2018, Mr. Greenberg wrote to a staff member that he had received an “emergency replacement” ID card from Mr. Gaetz by Tuesday, claiming that the Congressman had lost his ID. Mr Gaetz told Politico that he temporarily lost his wallet but found it before he needed the replacement ID.
Days after Mr Greenberg was first charged last year, a woman hit a tree with her car a few hundred meters from his home one morning. According to two people familiar with their relationship, the woman had previously had sex with Mr. Greenberg and received money from him for mobile payment apps. You left his house, people said.
When a neighbor called 911, according to a recording of the call, the woman screamed incoherently in the background. The neighbor said the woman was calling a friend. Moments later, on the end of the caller’s line, an unidentified man could be heard.
“She has a lump on her head,” said the man. “She has a small cut on her head. She is just very shaken. “
