Eleven people were arrested after a Miami-Dade County investigation uncovered disabled parking permit applications containing forged physician signatures, including paperwork attributed to a doctor who had already died.
The arrests were announced as part of Operation Parking Denied, an investigation by the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office Public Corruption Section into what deputies described as a fraudulent scheme involving improperly issued disabled parking permits.
The Sheriff’s Office said brokers allegedly supplied applicants with disability certification forms bearing forged physician signatures, allowing them to obtain disabled parking placards.
The arrests grew out of a much larger countywide review. By Aug. 13, the Miami-Dade County Tax Collector’s Office said it had reviewed more than 75,000 applications and that 6,190 had failed its final audit.
The Paper Trail
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The Tax Collector’s Office referred suspicious applications and supporting records for further review, leading the Sheriff’s Office Public Corruption Section to examine the medical certifications behind them.
Deputies said the investigation uncovered brokers who allegedly provided applicants with forms containing forged physician signatures.
Some of the applications carried the name of a physician who had died the previous year.
CBS News Miami reported, citing court records, that five of the people charged submitted applications in which the physician purportedly certified them as either legally blind or unable to walk more than 200 feet because of a disability.
The physician died in May 2025, and the signatures on those applications did not match signatures contained in state records, according to the station.
CBS also reported that three other defendants were accused of submitting applications containing a forged signature from another physician.
A $200 Shortcut
Sheriff Rosie Cordero-Stutz said evidence developed during the investigation pointed to people paying brokers as much as $200 for fraudulent medical certifications that could then be presented to obtain disabled parking placards.
One defendant, identified by CBS as Etian Vila, acknowledged he was not disabled when questioned, according to arrest records obtained by the station.
“I am not handicapped,” Vila said, according to the records quoted by CBS. He also said he threw away the placard after seeing news coverage about people getting in trouble over disabled parking permits.
The Sheriff’s Office did not say every defendant obtained a placard through the same broker or followed the same process. Its announcement described a broader scheme involving brokers, forged physician certifications and improperly issued permits.
The Tax Collector’s Office identified the 11 people arrested as Ryan Carbonell, Roberto Lopez, Jorge Yanes, Irene Oria, Juan Aristizabal, Rafael Brito Diaz, Kristina Drobachevskaia, Alexander Campo, Camilo Padilla, Lianne Quintero and Etian Vila.
CBS reported that each faced at least one felony charge.
The Wider Audit
The criminal cases represent only a small portion of the permits flagged during Miami-Dade County’s broader review.
The Tax Collector’s Office launched its countywide audit in December 2025, examining disabled parking permit applications filed during the previous two years.
By January, an initial review of 2,340 applications had identified 682 for deeper investigation. In April, the office said it had reviewed more than 33,000 applications and canceled roughly 2,000 placards that could not be validated or had been improperly issued.
The numbers continued climbing. An Aug. 13 update said more than 75,000 applications had been reviewed and 6,190 had failed the final audit.
Applications presenting evidence of possible fraud were referred for further investigation rather than being treated solely as administrative problems.
The Sheriff’s Office said Operation Parking Denied remained ongoing after the 11 arrests.