TALLAHASSEE — The Florida Commission on Ethics has found a former employee in Gov. Charlie Crist's office likely violated state ethics laws when he helped set up a Panhandle space-tourist program and then left to take a six-figure job there.

An investigation by the Governor's Office last year into a state-funded $500,000 space-tourist training program called “Project Odyssey” concluded that a state employee, who worked on the contract and then resigned his job to work for the clinic that won it, apparently violated of Florida's “revolving door” ethics laws.

The investigation, prompted by Orlando Sentinel reporters' questions in January, recommended that the former employee, Brice Harris, face an ethics commission review for sanction. But despite the findings, the governor declined to forward the complaint over the Commission on Ethics after Harris quit his job with the program. Afterward, a Clearwater man filed an ethics complaint, triggering the additional review.

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