Weighing the stage-three colon cancer diagnosis of a 50-year-old man accused of falsifying government documents for personal gain, a Broward County judge on Monday decided against the recommended two years in jail and instead sentenced him to 364 days in jail and 10 years of probation.
In December 2023, prosecutors accused former Plantation public works director Steven Rodgers of falsifying government documents to have an employee paint his girlfriend’s apartment in 2022. Prosecutors initially offered Rodgers a plea deal for probation, which he rejected in April 2024, pleading not guilty. Instead, he went to trial in December 2025, just weeks after his colon cancer diagnosis. He was found guilty.
At the Monday hearing, Rodgers gave a gory description of the pain and bleeding he’s faced since the verdict and said he delayed surgery to remove part of his colon until after sentencing because he wasn’t sure how to handle the situation…