FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Broward Sheriff Gregory Tony has broken “public trust” by being untruthful on driver’s license application forms — and should get his law enforcement certification suspended for a half-year, an attorney with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement recommends in a pending state case.

“The position of an officer is one of great public trust and the Respondent’s calculated actions have broken that trust,” wrote Andrew Digby, assistant general counsel for FDLE, wrote in a recommended order filed in court records Monday for an administrative judge’s consideration. “There can be no more basic public expectation than that those who enforce the laws must themselves obey the law.”

The FDLE recommends a six-month “prospective suspension of certification,” followed by one year of probation, with the requirement he complete a Criminal Justice Standards and Training Commission-approved ethics training.

There are several steps left in the case. Administrative Law Judge Robert Kilbride will make a recommendation in the case, and next the state Criminal Justice Standards and Training Commission will decide whether to accept Kilbride’s recommendation. On Tuesday, Tony’s lawyers filed their own recommended order, asking the judge dismiss the case.

Kilbride previously announced he will issue his recommended order on the matter 20 days after attorneys for both sides submit their proposed orders.

Tony has defended himself against accusations that he withheld information to receive a Florida driver’s license repeatedly between 2007 and 2019. A Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigator said Tony “was untruthful in his answers” to questions when he visited a driver’s license office in Lauderdale Lakes to obtain a replacement license while he was sheriff in 2019, but Tony testified he had been attesting at the time of his application “to what’s in front of” him, such as his biographical information.

“The offense of falsifying information on a driver license application is an act involving moral turpitude,” Digby wrote. Digby wrote that Tony, as the sheriff, emphasizing the word in his filing, “is inherently held to a higher standard due to his position being one of great power within the community.”

On Tuesday, Tony’s lawyers wrote in their 18-page document filed in court records that “one cannot conclude that the Respondent did unlawfully and knowingly make a false statement, knowingly conceal a material fact, or otherwise commit fraud in the applications, …” emphasizing the words.

“The Petitioner failed to prove by clear and convincing evidence” that Tony committed wrongdoing, they wrote.

State investigators concluded that in 1999 Tony correctly answered “yes” on forms when asked if his driving privilege had ever been revoked, suspended or denied in any other state. But between March 2002 and February 2019, he submitted 11 applications, and on eight of them, he answered “no.”

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