On Friday, the home of Jane Healy, former Orlando Sentinel Managing Editor and current Co-Chair of the Tourism Development Tax Citizen Advisory Committee, was raided by members of the Orlando Police Department.
This is the second such raid that has occurred at her home in the last 18 months.
Jane Healy’s son, Randall Healy Clark, who resides at the home, was arrested along with several others on counts of possession of controlled substances with intent to sell.
In a phone interview with Orlando Sentinel, Healy claims she was briefly handcuffed but not arrested.
Back in March, Healy was named Co-Chair for the Tourism Development Tax Citizen Advisory Committee by Mayor Jerry Demmings, a former law enforcement official.
In a statement announcing the appointment, Demings expressed his gratitude to Healy for bringing her leadership and deep knowledge of the Central Florida community to the task force.
As Co-Chair, Healy oversees the committee which reviews and provides input on how best to allocate Tourism Development Tax revenues. As of July, TDT revenues for fiscal year 2023 exceeded $254 million.
According to neighbors, Healy’s home has long been a lightning rod for criminal activity, ever since her son moved into the property nearly five years ago. One neighbor shared with Bungalower that several residents have moved away from the area as a result of this activity.
Last February, members of OPD’s SWAT and Special Enforcement Divisions were on their way to execute a search warrant on the residence when they intercepted Randall Clark and several others leaving the home in a car belonging to Jane Healy. The subsequent search of Healy’s home revealed additional controlled substances and paraphernalia.
According to the arrest affidavit, “an older female believed to be Jane Healy was seen leaving the residence before the arrival of the SWAT team. Healy was not seen again after leaving the immediate area and did not return during the execution of the search warrant.”
In a letter sent to the judge overseeing that case, a nearby resident wrote that “Clearly Jane Healy either does not know what goes on, knows but cannot control it, or knows but doesn’t care,” adding later that “evidently, Jane Healy lacks the judgment to either recognize a bad situation or take appropriate measures to prevent one.”
Bungalower asked Orange County officials what sort of background check or vetting process potential members of the TDT Citizen Advisory Committee are subjected to before they are nominated or selected, but the County did not respond in time for this article’s publication.
The committee is scheduled to present its findings at a County Commission meeting at 9 a.m. Tuesday, July 25. According to a report by Orlando Sentinel, Healy still intends to participate.
This is not a story about Jane, her former job, the Pulitzer Prize, or even the tax committee. It is a story about a trap house (google it) in a neighborhood of million-dollar homes. So yeah, it’s a legit story that probably should have been reported years ago.
I don’t live in Lake Davis, but I had a trap house across the street from me. It was very disruptive, dangerous and frightening. Getting rid of it (and all the sketchy people it brought to my driveway) was frustrating.
During the past 18 months I had zero drug raids at my house, but Jane had 3. Indeed, in my entire life I never had a drug raid at my house.
If someone in my household had an addiction problem, I would get them help. There is no way I would allow tweakers and their associates to camp at my house.
Finally, I know Jane. I was one of her direct reports. She always stressed personal responsibility so I’m at a loss to understand what happened to her.
It is sad that her son’s behavior has brought these unfortunate situations into her life. I completely understand how this can happen as I have siblings that have negative behaviors that have impacted my life also. I feel badly for how embarrassed she must be right now, for having a troubled son and trying to help him. It is miserable when someone you love has a serious problem with addiction. Fortunately, I have finally been able to cut ties, which was unbelievably difficult and incredibly heartbreaking, but necessary. I hope she finds a way to manage this situation and her son gets the help he needs, which, I’m sure would be much easier without the embarrassment of the public attention being drawn to her difficulties with her son. It must be awfully nice for the writer of this story to have such a perfect family life.
I was also surprised that Bungalower published this on their site.
A) A prominent woman has a son who potentially struggles with drug addiction, and has taken in this son to provide some means of support.
B) A local community interest blog which mostly reports on local restaurants and social events decides to report on something which, on its surface, is heartbreaking as a mother’s charity may have led to incredible embarrassment.
Not clear why Bungalower has chosen to report on this, because most of its reporting is extremely lightweight and often full of factual errors. It has no history to correcting its errors or doing the kind follow up leg work to ensure the facts are clear before they are available on the Internet for perpetuity. Please consider this when dipping into local scandals more worthy of tabloid journalism.
Well, I happily invite you to never read us again 🙂
She must be a complete space cadet…or simply not care about the criminal activity at her home that made life in the neighborhood miserable for everyone else. Yuck