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A former Miami-Dade police officer who was once honored as “Officer of the Year” has been arrested for impersonating law enforcement.
On September 22, Volusia County deputies were called to a residence in Deltona, 30 miles north of Orlando, in response to reports of a man parked in a driveway. Deputies say the man — later identified as 39-year-old Paul Fluty — claimed he was a Miami-Dade police officer working with the U.S. Marshals to search for a missing 13-year-old girl. He told deputies the girl’s phone had pinged in the neighborhood, according to an arrest report.
But authorities quickly determined Fluty wasn’t a police officer — at least not any more.
The Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office (MDSO) fired Fluty in May after he reportedly failed a drug test stemming from a domestic violence case. It was something of a fall from grace; in 2020, he was honored as the Miami-Dade Police Department’s “Officer of the Year.” (The department changed names in January of this year as part of a state-mandated transition.)
Several hours after his encounter with Volusia County deputies, Fluty was arrested and booked into a Volusia County jail on one count of impersonating a police officer. He was released on September 23 after posting a $2,000 bond.
Body-camera footage shared on social media by the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office shows Fluty flashing a police badge to deputies at the scene and pulling up a photo of his credentials on his phone. He told deputies the missing girl he was looking for “runs from the cops,” which he said explained why he wasn’t in a marked police car; he also claimed the girl hadn’t been “officially” logged as missing.
As deputies placed Fluty under arrest, he could be heard asking, “What did I do?”
“Google my name. I got officer of the year and everything,” he told deputies before being transported to jail.
Following his arrest, Fluty told authorities he’d provided his old badge and credentials “out of habit” and “by mistake,” and that he “accidentally” claimed to be a police officer, according to Volusia County officials.
A LinkedIn account that appears to belong to Fluty shows that he joined the Miami-Dade police force as a detective in 2007 and launched a GPS tracking company called GHOST Industries in August 2020.
Law enforcement officials in Volusia County say documents recovered during their investigation suggest Fluty now works as a private investigator and may have been in the area for an insurance case.
