Yesterday’s FBI raid on the home and business of Bob Cole may be tied to a suspicious 2009 land deal.
As a Santa Rosa County Commissioner, Cole was instrumental in helping Lifeguard Ambulance Service land a big contract to provide service to rural Santa Rosa County.
The local franchise is owned by John Roche, son of Tom Roche, who headed Emergency Operations for Santa Rosa County for decades until he retired in 2006.
On April 17, 2009, Cole sold a 9 percent portion of his 5-acre property—valued at $123,317.00 by the county’s property appraiser—to Beannacht Properties, LLC for $50,000.
Beannacht is a licensed Florida business that formed March 27, 2009, about a month before that sale. Its owners are listed as Nina Roche Cobb and Donald Cobb Jr. Nina is John Roche’s daughter. The IN couldn’t find any other land purchases by the company in Santa Rosa or Escambia counties.
IN checked and found that Nina Cobb works for Lifeguard.
“She works in our human resource-side,” said Jason Kimbrell, Lifeguard’s regional director of operations. “She works out of Pensacola.”
Kimbrell said that neither Roche Cobb, nor Cole was on Lifeguard’s board of directors. John Roche is on that board.
Hmmmm, this one will be interesting to follow.