ORLANDO — Life, it seems, is beautiful for LaMar Cook.
He is the fired Healey administration deputy accused of running eighteen pounds of cocaine through Gov. Maura Healey's own Springfield office. He is currently out on $25,000 bail. He is receiving Massachusetts taxpayer-funded SNAP benefits, which the state has clarified he is fully entitled to keep. And this weekend, he was dining at STK Disney Springs — Walt Disney World's swankiest steakhouse, where a 10-ounce Japanese Wagyu A5 filet costs $440.
LaMar Cook (far left) with Gov. Maura Healey (right) at an event before his firing.
The occasion, as one might expect from a man in his position, was a celebration. A family member's birthday party. And, in case anyone missed it, Cook made sure to post the photos himself — to his own public Facebook story.
The image shows Cook — in a white cap, a picture of unbothered contentment — seated at a long communal table with a party of eight to ten diners, in front of a spread of entrees, sides, and more than a dozen cocktails. Mass Daily News is not identifying the birthday celebrant. Cook, however, put his own face on his own Facebook page. That, one can only assume, was the point.
Cook (circled), in a white cap, at STK Disney Springs. Source: LaMar Cook's public Facebook story. Other faces obscured by MDN.
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STK Disney Springs at dusk. Photo: DisneyFoodBlog.com.
STK Disney Springs sits on Buena Vista Drive at the edge of Village Lake, tucked between the Rainforest Cafe and the Polite Pig. The menu prices its 34-ounce dry-aged tomahawk ribeye at $160, its 28-ounce dry-aged porterhouse at $122, its dry-aged Delmonico at $112, its bone-in strip at $92, and its cocktails between $18 and $22 — a range of figures that would exhaust the average Massachusetts SNAP recipient's monthly allotment in roughly ninety minutes of table service.
A Wagyu tomahawk plated at STK. Photo: STK Steakhouse.
Cook is, as Mass Daily News reported on Sunday, still receiving those Massachusetts SNAP benefits — swiping his state-issued EBT card at supermarkets in Kissimmee, the sunny Florida town from which Walt Disney World is a short walk away. The Massachusetts Department of Transitional Assistance, when asked to explain how a man awaiting trial on cocaine-trafficking charges retains eligibility for state welfare, cited federal rules that prevent the agency from doing anything about it. The rules, they say, tie their hands.
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The rules also, apparently, did not prevent Healey's office from cutting Cook a $31,000 "buyout" check in January after firing him for cause. The state, naturally, did not ask for the money back. Cook was released on $25,000 bail in March, reduced from an initial $75,000. He faces the possibility of decades in state prison if convicted on the cocaine-trafficking count alone. His trial date has not yet been set.
Which brings us to the coda of Cook's Facebook story.
Alongside the birthday-party photos from STK, Cook posted a screenshot of Mass Daily News's own reporting on him — the article about his Kissimmee EBT swipes and the mistaken $31,000 buyout — and captioned it with three laughing-crying emojis.
Cook's Facebook story: a screenshot of MDN's earlier reporting on him, captioned with three laughing-crying emojis. Source: LaMar Cook's public Facebook story.
There is no indication that Cook is unhappy. There is every indication that he is enjoying himself immensely. For what it's worth, LaMar Cook has good taste in restaurants — STK Disney Springs is genuinely excellent. The readers, meanwhile, have questions about who is picking up the tab.
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