The St. Petersburg Times blows up the buzz in downtown Tampa today with the revelation that a federal public corruption case is just about to pop.

From the story:

During a public interview Wednesday for his office’s top job, a high-ranking federal prosecutor from Tampa said he is close to charging a public official with public corruption.

The person has agreed to plead guilty, said Robert O’Neill, chief of the criminal division for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Tampa.

He did not name the public official. He noted that the case resulted from allegations he learned about in the newspaper.

Find out the leading suspects and take our poll about who you think it is, after the jump:

The leading suspects?

Former Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections Buddy Johnson, whose stewardship of the office during the 2008 elections has been the focus of numerous Times stories and federal officials. He could take the fall for misusing federal voting grants designed to inform and motivate voters but instead used to pimp his failed candidacy.

Thomas E. Stringer Sr., the 2nd District Court of Appeal judge who quit after being linked to a stripper who shared finances with him and accused the judge of helping her hide her assets from creditors. News Channel 8 and the Tampa Tribune broke that story.

Current County Commissioner Kevin White, who has been caught up in numerous scandals and sultry affairs, including a civil lawsuit brought by a former aide who says she was sexually discriminated against. He has also been accused of wrongdoing by a convicted mortgage swindler.

The Times also lists the possibility that it could be a lower-level functionary in Hillsborough County’s Affordable Housing Office, which its own county commissioners say wasted $2 million in federal money.

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