TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) – Three tickets, two purchased in Broward County, matched all five Fantasy 5 numbers to collect a jackpot worth $92,069.38 each, the Florida Lottery said Sunday.
The winning tickets were bought in Plantation and Tamarac and in Homosassa, lottery officials said.
The numbers drawn Saturday night were 1-3-16-18-25
The 463 tickets matching four numbers won $96 each.
There was no Florida Lotto winner. The jackpot is now $16 million for Wednesday’s drawing.
A Miami-Dade police officer, who routinely stopped women drivers without cause and engaged in lewd conversations, was convicted in federal court Friday.
Prabhainjana Dwivedi, a seven-year veteran, was found guilty on six of seven counts of depriving people of their civil rights. He was found not guilty on the seventh count involving an undercover police officer.
Following the ruling, U.S. District Judge Jose Martinez immediately remanded Dwivedi back into custody pending sentencing scheduled for sometime in April, according to prosecutor Karen Gilbert. The trial began Monday.
Dwivedi faces up to a year in prison for each count.
A grand jury indicted Dwivedi after he was arrested by FBI agents Sept. 5 at Miami-Dade police headquarters.
Dwivedi, 33, was charged after an investigation into complaints filed for stops made in May and June of 2011 in which he detained “numerous women” for “unreasonable” length of time “without probable cause, reasonable suspicion or other lawful authority to conduct a stop,” a criminal complaint said.
None of the questionable stops were ever listed on his daily reports or called into dispatch.
According to the complaint, Dwivedi who worked overnight patrolling an area from Key Biscayne to Jackson Memorial Hospital, stopped a 24-year-old bartender who was driving from South Beach to Broward County on her way home from work at about 5:30 a.m. on June 25, 2011, in the area of the Golden Glades interchange.
The bartender, identified as M.F., was accused by Dwivedi of driving under the influence. Pleading her innocence, she requested to have a sobriety test performed. Her request was refused.
Noticing a child’s safety seat in the back seat, Dwivedi threatened M.F. that she would lose custody of her son if she were to be arrested on DUI charges, the criminal complaint said. Then the conversation turned sexual.
According to the complaint, Dwivedi, began to inquire about her surgically enhanced breasts and asked “if she had any scars or incisions from the surgery.”
Dwivedi then asked to see the scars. M.F. obeyed, lifting her shirt and exposing her breasts.
According to the complaint written by FBI special agent Susan Funk, “M.F. stated that Dwivedi did not touch her breast.”
, Dwivedi then allowed her to drive home, but said he would follow her to make sure she got safely home. Once at M.F.’s residence, Dwivedi said he was thirsty and asked for a glass of water. Once inside her home, he lingered for an hour speaking of his personal life.
In the end, Dwivedi left without ever reporting anything to dispatch or making any notes of the stop in his daily reports, the criminal complaint said.
A month earlier, Dwivedi made another questionable stop.
According to the complaint, Dwivedi stopped a19-year-old woman at 2:20 a.m. on May 27, 2011, on her way home from a nightclub with two friends. The woman, identified, as A.R., was informed the traffic stop was a result of a failure to turn on her headlights.
Dwivedi also claimed she was driving under the influence, but A.R. disputed the accusation.
A.R. was instructed to sit in the back seat of his marked cruiser and then Dwivedi “instructed A.R. to lower the zipper on the front of her dress down past her breasts to her mid-stomach” according to the complaint.
An hour and 20 minutes later, A.R. was on her way home without any citation and Dwivedi again made no mention or note of the stop, the complaint said.
Miami Herald staff writer Jay Weaver contributed to this report.
Three gunmen open fired in front of a Miami Gardens home on Super Bowl Sunday, killing Brandon Bryant, a local promoter, and injuring his father and brother.
At a press conference Friday morning, police released graphic footage of the shooting.
From a red four-door sedan, gunfire can be seen coming from the passenger-side back-seat window. The car stops and the driver, dressed in dark orange or red, jumps out with a gun and disappears from the screen. The passenger slides over to the driver seat and also begins to fire. As the driver returns to the car, the passenger exits with a long barreled gun and continues to shoot before he too gets back in the car, and they drive off.
In all, police say they are looking for three gunmen.
Miami Gardens police and Bryant’s family at Friday’s press conference asked for the community to come forward with any tips about the shooting.
“We believe that someone out there has information that can help bring closure to this family and bring these violent individuals to justice,” said Police Chief Matthew Boyd
Bryant and his family were at a Super Bowl barbecue watching the Baltimore Ravens and San Francisco 49ers face off in New Orleans. Witnesses told police at least 30 shots rang out near the home on the 2300 block of Northwest 204th Street
Police say one of the victims remains in the hospital, but declined to say which one. Police would not release their names or a motive for Sunday night’s shootings.
A Miami Gardens pastor who has spoken publicly about the prevalent no-snitching culture pleaded with Miami Gardens residents to break the cycle.
“Remember today is their day, tomorrow could be your day,” he said.
Bryant’s family describe the 25-year-old as a beloved member of their family who had an entrepreneurial spirit.
He ran a marketing and artist-development firm that worked with local hip-hop artists. He was the father of two young boys, ages 15 months and 4 months.
“It’s very difficult for us right now to endure this,” said Nina Packer, Bryant’s aunt and the family’s spokesperson.
“As lifelong members of this community, this has got to stop,” she said. “This is a problem”
Police ask anyone with information to contact Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers anonymously at 305-471-8477 or Miami Garden Police at 305-474-4673.
WEST PALM BEACH --
Minutes after a jury late Wednesday awarded a mentally challenged Pahokee girl $1.7 million for the trauma she suffered when she was raped on a Palm Beach County school bus when she was 3, the girl’s mother rushed toward those who had given her daughter a second chance.
“Wait,” she called out just before they filed out the door. “I want to thank all of you.”
In turn, she hugged each of the four women and two men who rejected the school board’s claims that her daughter wasn’t hurt by the 2007 attack. School board attorneys argued the girl was too young and too mentally disabled to understand what a 15-year-old emotionally disturbed youth did to her on the bus filled with special needs kids.
With tears streaming down her face, the mother looked at the girl’s father. Both heaved sighs of relief.
“It means a lot to me,” she said of the verdict. “My daughter finally got justice.”
The School Board never denied the girl was molested. Both the bus driver and the aide who was on the bus to protect the students were fired. The aide, Grenisha Williams, was convicted of child neglect in connection with the incident and put on probation. Sexual battery charges were filed against J.C. Carter, the youth school police said assaulted the child. The School Board even changed policies, decreeing that young children should no longer be allowed to ride buses with older kids.
But, the district never agreed to compensate the now 9-year-old girl for the trauma that her attorneys argued exacerbated her considerable learning problems.
“I think the jury got it,” attorney Stephan Le Clainche said.
Despite School Board attorneys’ claims to the contrary, he said: “The jury realized that any child of a tender age who is the victim of physical or sexual violence is going to carry the stain of it their entire life.”
But, he acknowledged, the battle is far from over. Under Florida law, government agencies in 2007 could only be forced to pay $100,000 for injuries caused by their wrongdoing. (The cap on so-called sovereign immunity, that comes from the English concept that the King can do no wrong, has since been raised to $200,000.) But to get more than $100,000, the girl’s attorneys must now persuade a typically stubborn Florida Legislature to life the cap so the girl can get the $1.7 million the jury said she deserves.
“We have a long road to go,” Le Clainche said. The $100,000 will barely cover the court costs that included paying $25,000 to a psychiatrist who persuaded the jury that the girl carries deep psychological scars that will take years of counseling and private schooling to salve.
The mother said she was well aware of the looming battle. “I’ve been waiting all this time. I guess I can wait some more,” said the mother, who lost her job as a cook when the always shaky economy in the Glades got even worse in the recent recession.
Jurors declined comment on the verdict, as did attorneys representing the school board. Attorney Scott Krevens said they don’t comment on pending litigation.
But the two sides argued their cases vigorously Wednesday in their last appearances before the jury after a five-day trial.
Attorney Tom McCausland, one of the school board’s two attorneys, suggested that the jury give the girl $250,000 for the pain she endured on the day of the attack and $31,000 for family counseling.
“A quarter-million dollars is a way of saying we’re sorry it happened,” he said.
Le Clainche bristled at McCausland’s suggestion that the money was an apology and not a recognition that the girl needs years of therapy.
McCausland insisted the girl has no memory of the attack. “Her brain has not been able to form to grasp the event,” McCausland told jurors. “This very, very heinous act, fortunately, is not something the girl remembers.”
Le Clainche translated McCausland’s argument this way: “Your harm is worth nothing because you’re already damaged.” Then, he added, “That is an incredible, outrageous defense.”
The psychiatrist hired by the girl’s team testified that the attack stymied the girl’s emotional and intellectual growth. A psychologist hired by the school board told jurors trauma doesn’t affect cognitive development.
In the end, it was clear the jury accepted the long-standing child-rearing concept that early childhood development impacts a youngster’s entire life.
About two hours into their deliberations, the jurors sent out a question: “Can the possibility of future sexual problems be considered as future pain and suffering?”
Circuit Judge Glenn Kelley said they could.
Less than 15 minutes later, they announced their verdict.
Guard your identity with your life, warns South Florida’s top law enforcement official.
U.S. Attorney Wifredo Ferrer says the double whammy of ID theft and tax-refund scams are the “new Medicare fraud,” picking the pockets of hard-working people and the federal government every year for billions of dollars.
“We need to protect our personal identities as best we can,” Ferrer told The Miami Herald. “One of the best ways to protect yourself is to file your tax returns as early as possible to beat the criminals to the punch.”
The Miami area, infamous for its smorgasbord of fraud schemes, is among the worst spots for what he described as an “epidemic” ID-theft crime wave. To drive home his point at the height of the tax season, Ferrer’s office unveiled the latest prosecutions of 14 defendants in a variety of tax-refund rackets.
Among them: Yet another case of a South Florida hospital employee swiping patients’ Social Security numbers and dates of birth to defraud the Internal Revenue Service.
According to an indictment filed in January, Boca Raton Regional Hospital scheduler Shalamar Major, 32, of Deerfield Beach, stole the personal information of patients and supplied the data to Tanisha Wright in exchange for a split fee for every successful false return submitted to the IRS.
Wright, 27, of Fort Lauderdale, is accused of filing the returns electronically and getting the IRS to direct-deposit the refunds on pre-paid reloadable debit cards, so she could make withdrawals at ATMs or retail purchases. In total, she filed 57 returns seeking $306,720, according to the indictment.
Other prosecutions include:
• In an IRS undercover sting last month, Nael Dawud Sammour, 52, was charged with theft of public money after he tried to cash 75 fraudulently obtained tax-refund checks totaling $750,369, according to an indictment. Sammour was arrested after he allegedly used counterfeit driver’s licenses and Social Security cards to cash the refunds through IRS agents posing as check cashers. Agents seized $30,128 from him.
• Two other defendants, Fednol Pierre, 34, of Miami, and Jeanson Pata, 31, of West Palm Beach, were charged in January with stealing government funds and aggravated ID theft involving six fraudulent refunds totaling $52,535.
• Last week, five defendants — Jeffrey Andre Young Jr., 31, of Miami, Joseph Bshara, 27, of Miami Shores, Siham Benabdallah, 23, of Miami Shores, along with Douglas Michael Young, 41, and Nicole Young, 42, owners of two Miami tax preparation companies — pleaded guilty to a fraud conspiracy involving $37,749 in cashed refund checks.
Perpetrators in South Florida, Tampa and other regions of the country steal the identities of people who don’t file income tax returns in order to avoid having the IRS detect duplicate filings, authorities say. They also swipe people’s IDs to file phony tax returns. Combined, the schemes have robbed the U.S. government of billions of dollars yearly since the crime began spreading in 2008, according to a Treasury Department report.
South Florida victims of these and similar crimes run the gamut: police officers, Holocaust survivors, U.S. Marines stationed in Afghanistan, school children, hospital patients and senior citizens.
What’s fueling the fraud? Florida has the highest rate of identity theft in the country, with 178 complaints per 100,000 residents last year, followed by Georgia, with 120 complaints per 100,000 residents, according to the Federal Trade Commission.
Frank Falestra is standing at the backyard bar of Churchill’s Pub, tinkering with a lighting board that has a broken switch.
It’s an urgent repair because the switch controls red light.
“Red is important at a rock bar,” he says.
Falestra, better known as Rat Bastard, is hailed as the godfather of Miami’s noise scene and the founder of International Noise Conference, an annual festival celebrating musical nonconformity.
Every year, the festival draws hundreds to three-decades-old Churchill’s Pub, where noise fans and other revelers gather to sing, dance, screech and, sometimes, bloody each other’s noses.
International Noise Conference will kick off its 10th year starting 10 p.m. Wednesday at Churchill’s, 5501 NE Second Ave. The festival continues at 9 p.m. Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday and 3 p.m. Saturday.
Falestra, 54, expects more than 100 bands to show up. That number is about the same as the last few years, but the fourth night of the festival is new, thanks to funding from the Knight Foundation’s Knight Arts Challenge.
Admission to the festival, as always, is free.
“We keep the money thing completely out of it,” Falestra said. “That’s probably why it’s still going.”
There are only two hard-and-fast rules for musicians performing at INC: no laptops, and get off the stage in 15 minutes or less.
The laptop rule is to prevent the show from getting boring, Falestra says.
But the time limit? Artists have flown all the way from France and Australia to perform at INC. And they only get 15 minutes?
According to Falestra, a 30-year veteran of the Miami music scene, that’s all you need to get the point across.
“Usually 20 minutes of anybody is too much,” he said. “Like the Foo Fighters. You wouldn’t want to see them for 20 minutes. Ten minutes would kill you.”
Page 27, a Denver-based noise band, has one of the farthest commutes on the set list this year. Like most of the other bands, INC is the only show pulling Page 27 away from its hometown this time of year.
But member John Gross, 35, said the band is looking forward to the networking opportunities as much as the brief set. The best part for him, he said, is going to the tables in the back of the bar to trade CDs, tapes and records with other bands. “You end up finding a lot of music that you don’t see anywhere else,” Gross said.
The first two days of the festival, which feature local bands almost exclusively, are heavy on different music genres. Thursday is usually the most outrageous night. Sometimes, Falestra says, people get naked.
Many of the bands will play noise sets regardless of their typical musical style. This might include an avant-garde mix of improvisational drumming, playing non-musical objects such as sheets of glass or screaming into a microphone.
Novice noise fans shouldn’t be afraid, though. In spite of its name, INC doesn’t require that every set consist of noise. It’s possible to hear something approaching listenable music at the show.
Although he disdains the pop-punk bands that flood college radio stations these days (he has a particular distaste for Green Day), Falestra said he’s not averse to tossing more mainstream acts into the lineup to keep things from getting predictable.
SANTO DOMINGO --
Prominent Dominican lawyer Vinicio Castillo on Monday said allegations that linked U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez to sex parties with prostitutes in the Dominican Republic were part of a “dirty campaign” aimed at discrediting his cousin, a Florida eye doctor who has a stalled multi-million-dollar for security at Dominican ports.
Castillo said Monday he will formally request Dominican authorities open an investigation into the source of allegations that claimed Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat, and Florida ophthalmologist Salomon Melgen had sex parties with prostitutes, including some that were underage.
Those allegations first surfaced last year on a conservative U.S. website. The scandal gained prominence last month when the FBI raided Melgen’s Florida offices and Menendez’s office said he had repaid the doctor $58,000 for trips to the Dominican Republic on his private jet.
The source of the allegations, who used the e-mail handle Peter Williams, has not come forward; neither have the prostitutes who provided videotaped interviews for the website.
Castillo, who was also named by the tipster, said his reputation has been damaged.
The Dominican National Police’s High-Tech Crimes Division “should ask for and receive help from the FBI and DEA, to establish who … put together false testimonies and documents fabricated to morally assassinate Senator Menendez” and Melgen, Castillo said, reading from a prepared statement at a press conference in his family’s Santo Domingo law offices.
Castillo called the allegations part of a “diabolical plot” orchestrated to discredit Melgen, who owns a company with a lucrative contract with the Dominican government to provide X-ray machines at ports. The machines would be used to scan shipping containers to look for contraband and illegal drugs.
The contract was originally signed with the Dominican government a decade ago. Two years ago, Melgen bought out the company that had signed the contract.
That contract has raised controversy due to its cost — an estimated $500 million to $1 billion over 20 years. And the machines have not been installed.
Menendez, who has received healthy campaign contributions from the doctor, in a July Senate hearing peppered Obama officials about what they were doing to help U.S. business interests in the Dominican Republic. He specifically mentioned the contract for X-ray equipment at the ports.
Castillo’s father, Vinicio “Vincho” Castillo, the government’s drug czar and Melgen’s uncle, has also spoken about the need for the machines.
Castillo contends that a “campaign of defamation” was orchestrated to prevent the contract from being executed and keep the X-ray machines out of the ports.
Some four million shipping containers move through the ports each year and there is currently just one X-ray machine.
The Dominican National Office for Drug Control has said that traffickers are using the ports to ship cocaine through the Dominican Republic to the U.S. and Europe.
Following an international seminar on maritime drug trafficking held in Punta Cana in December, a European Union anti-narcotics division declared that trafficking through the Caribbean had spiked.
“In the last two years cocaine traffic from the Caribbean to Europe has experimented a dramatic 800 percent increase,” the report concluded, without mentioning how much cocaine that might be.
“It’s evident that drug trafficking and its powerful allies in the country don’t have any interest in this technology being implemented in our ports,” Castillo said.
After a block and a half they came to the Clevelander, a legendary South Beach bar bearing no resemblance to anything that has ever existed in Cleveland. On a small stage next to the packed bar a woman wearing a basically invisible bikini was writhing to inhumanly loud pounding music. Nearby, beneath a sign that said D.J. BOOGA WOOGA was a man wearing black lace-up boots and a purple thong held up by orange suspenders. He was shouting into a microphone: “LAST CALL FOR THE MISS HOT AMATEUR BOD CONTEST! LADIES COME ON UP! FIRST PRIZE IS ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS! COME ON LADIES! LET’S SEE WHAT YOU GOT!”
Standing near the DJ were a dozen young women wearing garments that, if all of them were combined, might have provided enough fabric to make a sock.
“We should stop here,” said Kevin.
“No we shouldn’t,” said Seth. “We need to get to the Ritz.”
“We can’t get to the Ritz,” said Kevin. “Admit it. We tried, and we failed.”
“Plus,” said Marty, “they don’t have Miss Hot Amateur Bod at the Ritz, not to mention D.J. Booga Wooga.”
Seth looked back out at Ocean Drive. Still no taxis.
“Maybe there’s a bus to Key Biscayne,” said Big Steve.
“Shut up, Steve,” said Kevin.
“Come on, Seth,” said Marty. “One drink.”
“OK,” said Seth, dragging his suitcase toward the bar. “One drink.”
* * *
Three hours later, they were on their fifth pitcher of margaritas. The pitchers were $50 apiece, plus a generous tip for Vicki the bartender, with whom Kevin had fallen deeply in love. Kevin was also in love with Cyndi Friend Gonzalez, an outgoing young woman who had finished fourth in the Miss Hot Amateur Bod competition, and who was wearing a dress made from roughly one square inch of some extremely stretchy material. At Kevin’s invitation, Cyndi had joined the Groom Posse at the bar; she had in turn been joined by a friend of hers, a large bald man named Duane.
The posse was not thrilled about Duane, but nobody told him to leave, because in addition to being large, he had an 11-foot Burmese albino python named Blossom draped over his shoulders. Duane made his living collecting tips from tourists who wanted to have their pictures taken with Blossom. He’d been doing this for eight years and considered himself a professional. He also considered himself an ambassador for Miami, and upon learning that Seth was about to get married, he had appointed himself as tour guide.
“This is my town,” he said. “ ¿Se hablo españolo? You need weed? Oxy?”
“I think we’re good,” said Seth.
Duane brandished Blossom. “You want to hold her? No charge for the groom, man.”
“Maybe later,” said Seth, leaning back to avoid Blossom’s flicking tongue.
“Just say the word,” said Duane, pouring Seth and himself another glass from the pitcher, finishing it. Kevin waved to Vicki for another.
The Clevelander was now very crowded and making far more noise than the entire state of Nebraska. The sea-salted night air was warm and sticky and thick with the aromas of spilled beer and cigar smoke and Axe body spray and billowing clouds of do-me perfume worn by women who were not wearing a whole lot else. Seth was staring at one of these women, wondering how she sat down in that dress and hoping she would attempt to do so soon, when he realized that Big Steve was shouting something into his ear, trying to be heard over the all-obliterating boom-boom issuing from the coffin-sized speakers of D.J. Booga Wooga.
“WHAT?” said Seth.
“THE HOTEL!” said Big Steve. He held up his phone so Seth could see the time: 9:30. Seth frowned. He swiveled toward Marty, grabbing the bar to keep from falling off the stool.
“MARTY.”
“WHAT?”
“WE NEED TO GET TO THE HOTEL!”
“WHAT?”
“THE HOTEL!”
Marty frowned deeply for several seconds, processing this concept, then said, “WHAT?”
“Never mind,” said Seth. Realizing it was time to take matters into his own hands, he turned away from Marty and slid smoothly off the stool. He continued sliding smoothly until he found himself on all fours under the bar. He decided to remain that way for a bit, collecting his thoughts.
He’d been down there a while and had yet to collect any when he became vaguely aware of voices shouting above him in the thumping din. He heard his name, and realized that the voices belonged to Marty, Big Steve and Kevin, who, apparently unaware that he was under the bar, were trying to figure out where he was.
“Hey!” said Seth. “Down here!”
They didn’t hear him. Their voices were louder now, and more concerned.
“Hey!” Seth repeated, again going unheard. He thought about attempting to stand up, but at the moment that didn’t seem to be a good idea, or even possible. He decided to collect his thoughts some more and soon fell asleep with his back against the bar.
Police are investigating details surrounding the death of an elderly woman found inside her home near midtown Miami.
Shortly after 4 p.m. Friday, Miami Police officers went to the home of Carmen Diaz, 78, whose adult son decided to visit her after not hearing from her in a few days, according to a news release. When he arrived, he found Diaz dead inside her home of 50 years at 120 NW 34 St.
Miami Police spokeswoman Kenia Reyes said although the death appeared “somewhat suspicious,” the department isn’t releasing details until the county medical examiner determines the cause of death.
WSVN-Channel 7 reported that the adult son found Diaz’s house ransacked and her body wrapped in a blanket in her bathroom.
Police confirmed the house was in disarray, but wouldn’t say if there had been a burglary.
The Miami-Dade County Medical Examiner is currently investigating the scene.
This article will be updated as more information becomes available.
Efforts to protect native animals in Florida Keys wildlife refuges will trap feral cats and other unwanted "pests," say federal managers.
The "Final Integrated Pest Management Plan" for the Florida Keys National Wildlife Refuges, released this week, says U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service staff "will begin actively controlling and removing certain exotic animals from public lands within these refuges."
That includes national wildlife lands at Crocodile Lake on North Key Largo, National Key Deer Refuge based on Big Pine Key, and the Great White Heron and Key West refuges in the Lower Keys.
"They've been talking about this for several years but this is the first we've heard that they're actually going to begin implementation," said Jerry Dykhuisen, an officer of Forgotten Felines, a cat-rescue group in the Middle and Lower Keys.
Forgotten Felines and several other national animal groups oppose trapping feral cats, which often are considered unadoptable and put to death.
A number of conservation groups including the Sierra Club, National Wildlife Federation and the American Bird Conservancy support the plan, saying birds and local endangered species have few defenses against predatory cats that do not belong in Keys wild areas.
"In terms of influencing the Lower Keys marsh rabbit or Key Largo woodrats chance of persisting, the significance of cat predation exceeds other threats," says the management plan. "Cats impact a remarkable proportion of species in affected communities."
White-crowned pigeons and many other protected bird species "depend upon Keys habitats to sustain them before and after long, over-water migrations," said Audubon Florida's Julie Wraithmell in an FWS statement. "This management plan helps ensure a future for these species in the Florida Keys."
Phillip Hughes, an FWS biologist and acting manager at the Key Deer refuge, said the agency will not mount a large-scale trapping program, but will place traps in known areas where cats and wildlife may come together.
Cats captured will be taken to local animal shelters where staff "can use their expertise regard final disposition of the cats..."
That could include trying to place the cats with "responsible pet owners or placement in long-term cat care facilities on the mainland."
The county-contracted shelter closest to Big Pine Key is based in Marathon.
"When they were talking about this before, there was a no-kill shelter on Big Pine where people could go to get their pets back," Dykhuisen said. "Now there's no shelter at all, so that's a complicating factor."
Iguanas, also considered an unwanted exotic species that eats plants needed by native wildlife, also could be targeted under the plan.
When the draft Pest Management Plan was published in late 2010, the Fish and Wildlife Service received 9,614 comments. The final plan says "over 99 percent" of those were "Internet-generated letters with standard comments."
Faced with a petition demanding his ouster and a new report citing decreasing moral, Pascal Goldschmidt, dean of the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, gave an impassioned defense of his administration late Wednesday but said he understood faculty anger and vowed to change direction.
Speaking to a packed, rancorous faculty senate meeting of serveral hundred at the medical school, Goldschmidt listened to angry objections and said he was dealing with them. Shortly afterward, he issued a formal letter saying that, after hearing “the concerns of faculty and staff,” he decided a “change in course and team was warranted.”
Meanwhile, the senate heard a new report that the faculty petition “demonstrates the seriousness of the loss of confidence in the senior leadership of the medical school.”
Perhaps the most dramatic moment during the meeting, according to several anonymous sources, came when Bernie Fogel, a former medical school dean, rose to tell Goldschmidt that the faculty had lost confidence in the leadership.
On Thursday, when contacted by the Herald. Fogel, who has spent virtually his entire career at UM, confirmed his statements at the meeting. “It was heartbreaking for me to point out that there is a lack of trust and confidence in the leadership of this school.”
Goldschmidt’s formal letter to faculty said he had to make hard decisions because of the school’s tough economic situation. That resulted in laying off almost 1000 full-time and part-time employees, as part of executing “a major turnaround.”
“Today, our financial results are much improved. Seven months into the fiscal year, we are $8 million in the black, $9 million ahead of plan, $36 million favorable to the prior year, and well on our way to surpassing our commitment to deliver $27 million to help rebuild UM’s balance sheet,” Goldschmidt wrote. “This is after reserving funds for all bonuses and clinical incentives that we have pledged to our hard-working faculty and staff.”
Goldschmidt said faculty and staff will be getting a 3 percent merit increase starting June 1.
“We had no time needed to make tough decisions. The process was painful for leaders, faculty and staff alike. It was especially difficult for me personally. ....
“At the end of December, when we realized that our performance had indeed improved and stabilized, it was time to refocus. I listened to the concerns of faculty and staff via their Chairs, the Medical Faculty Council representatives and their petition, and through direct, one-on-one conversations. This made me decide that a change in course and team was warranted.
“I demonstrated my commitment to the staff and faculty of the Miller School by taking immediate action, bringing onto my team longtime UM leaders familiar with our culture and values. It is important to me that we remain an institution with common goals and shared successes with the members of our School and the entire UM family.”
Goldschmidt said he intended to “invite faculty volunteers to key advisory committees, whose mission will be to express the needs and concerns of the faculty directly to me, and to implement our shared vision during this transition time.”
The senate’s ad hoc committee on the medical school, in a report dated Jan. 14, said, “The committee acknowledges and appreciates the significant recent steps taken by the university to address” faculty complaints. “However, we are aware of deep and worsening skepticism among many medical school faculty and staff concerning whether leaders of the medical school share these values. The fear of retribution persists.”
Goldschmidt told the gathering that he has never punished anyone who has spoken out against him or his actions.
A Miami Gardens woman is being held in jail after police found her toddler son wandering alone outside.
Mathieu Anice, 28, was arrested Tuesday night after she told police she was not aware her 2-year-old was found on the streets, according to Miami Herald news partner CBS4. Police were tipped off after getting several calls from people who noticed the toddler.
“After a while they asked questions in the neighborhood and they came to a house where they pointed where the child lives,” said Miami Gardens Police Capt. Ralph Suarez told CBS4.
“The units brought the kid to the house and it was at that point she realized the child was missing.”
Officers located Anice in the 3400 block of 177th Terrace. According to the station, Anice was arrested in March 2012 on felony child neglect charges.
Anice is being held on $5,000 bond. Her son and other children in the home have been removed by the state.
Florida would save money over the next decade — not lose billions as Gov. Rick Scott has argued — by accepting Medicaid expansion under federal healthcare reforms, according to a detailed economic study.
Miami-Dade legislators and healthcare industry leaders, getting together on Monday, heard about the report by Georgetown University — the most positive yet on a highly debated provision of what is often called Obamacare.
Jack Hoadley, a senior researcher with the Georgetown Health Policy Institute, said the study was the first to calculate spin-off savings in other state programs if Florida accepted the expansion, which over the next 10 years could bring $26 billion in federal funds to provide insurance to an estimated 815,000 to 1.3 million Florida residents who are now uninsured.
In Miami-Dade, expansion would cover an additional 150,000 to 225,000, according to the Georgetown projections. That reduction in the uninsured would bring huge relief to the county’s hospitals, which by federal law must treat anyone who comes to the emergency room, regardless of ability to pay.
The top-level meeting, at the United Way of Miami-Dade headquarters, was convened by United Way, Health Council of South Florida and Health Foundation of South Florida.
At the very least, the Georgetown findings and other recent analyses have some critics reconsidering opposition to the 2010 Affordable Health Care Act.
State Sen. Rene Garcia, R-Hialeah, who previously was an “absolute no” vote against Medicaid expansion, said after the meeting that he was now “open to the thought” that expansion makes sense.
State Rep. Eddy Gonzalez, R-Hialeah, said he was still concerned about the debt-ridden feds’ ability to fund Medicaid over the long term, but “we are looking at all the options.”
Estimates about the real costs of expansion have varied wildly based on the law, which requires the federal government to pay all costs of the expansion for the first three years. Starting in 2017, the state will start paying a small share, which will reach 10 percent of the expansion costs for 2020 and beyond.
Gov. Scott, who has long been critical of Obamacare, contended in December that expansion would cost Florida taxpayers more than $26 billion over 10 years. Opponents and healthcare experts criticized that estimate as way too high, and earlier this month the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration gave a much lower estimate of $3 billion for the decade.
That was lower even than a report by the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, a Washington research group, which in November estimated that expansion would cover an additional 1.2 million residents at a cost to the state of $5.4 billion over 10 years.
Georgetown’s Hoadley said Monday that the Kaiser study used only rough data for all 50 states, while the Georgetown study, funded by two Florida nonprofit foundations, looked in detail at how Medicaid expansion would save money in other areas. The Georgetown study found that the state would have to spend less for safety-net hospitals such as Jackson Health System, mental-health and substance-abuse programs and the medically needy program.
Hoadley said the savings calculations were “a very cautious estimate.”
The Georgetown report projected that the state would save $300 million in 2014, the first year of Medicaid expansion, and $100 million in 2020, when the state would be paying for 10 percent of the expansion costs.
The Georgetown study found that expansion was especially important in Florida, where almost one in three — 30 percent — of nonelderly adults are uninsured, compared to 18 percent nationwide.
In South Florida, the figures are even higher for uninsured non-elderly adults: 57 percent in Hialeah, 50 percent in the city of Miami, 48.5 percent in Deerfield Beach and 31.2 percent in Kendall.
Hospitals strongly support the expansion. On Monday, Phillis Oeters, an executive with Baptist Health South Florida, told legislators that hospitals have already seen their Medicare and Medicaid payments reduced greatly in other areas.
“Enough is enough,” she said. “Hospitals can’t take it anymore.”
A study done for the Florida Hospital Association estimated that the infusion of federal funds from Obamacare would add 56,000 jobs to the state.
Four No Name Key residents filed a $10 million discrimination lawsuit against Monroe County Thursday in Circuit Court.
Jim and Ruth Newton, along with Robert and Julianne Reynolds, allege the county has for years willfully denied the Lower Keys island commercial power without proper cause. Currently homes there are powered by solar and generators.
"The county has a long history of discrimination against that island and the residents and its very flagrant. And if it's not discrimination, it's ignorance," Reynolds said Friday.
The crux of the plaintiffs' argument is Chief Circuit Court Judge David Audlin's ruling in 2011 that the state Public Service Commission has jurisdiction over the matter, not the county.
That ruling came about from a county filing asking Audlin to decide whether county law allows commercial electricity on No Name. County officials say the law doesn't allow it and that it can't issue permits for it.
The suit concentrates on Monroe County fighting the installation of 62 Keys Energy Services power poles last year, as well as a 2001 county ordinance creating a coastal barrier overlay district prohibiting commercial utilities in federal coastal barrier areas.
Congress created the Coastal Barrier Resource System in 1982, and updated it in 1990, to protect undeveloped coastal barrier areas.
The lawsuit also addresses the Newtons' controversial application last year for an electrical building permit from the county. Originally granted, it was revoked when county officials realized their home is on No Name.
In addition to the $10 million in damages -- which Reynolds called a "low" number-- the plaintiffs want Audlin to void the county's coastal barrier overlay district law and grant homeowners electrical permits.
"If you knew what this has done to the friendships and relationships there ... it's pretty much the only thing they think about and talk about. I don't know what the value of my peace of mind is, but in my mind it's pretty significant," Reynolds said.
He's owned a house on No Name since 2005.
Marian Cline Krutulis, the founder and head of the prestigious Gulliver Schools in Coral Gables, died Saturday night. She was 89.
Known on campus as “Mrs. K,” Krutulis taught or shaped thousands of young people during her 60-year tenure at Gulliver, which has with four campuses in Coral Gables, Pinecrest and Miami, serving more than 2,200 students from pre-kindergarten through high school.
“Mrs. Krutulis has left a major impact on education in Miami,” said Emilio Nuñez, chairman and president of the Gulliver Schools board and a 1983 graduate. “Her vision went beyond academics, the arts, foreign languages and athletics. She created an environment of caring, trust and intellectual enrichment for all students.”
Krutulis bought Gulliver Academy in 1953, with a small number of students in one building in Coconut Grove. She served as director of the school from 1954 through 2007, when her son John Krutulis became head of schools. She remained involved with the programs as director emeritus.
When Krutulis stepped down, Gulliver was the largest independent school in Miami-Dade, with more than 30 advanced placement courses, honors and college preparatory classes and dual enrollment programs at Miami Dade College, Florida International University and the University of Miami. Last year, Gulliver graduates enrolled at Harvard University, Yale University, the University of Pennsylvania, Duke University, Emory University and Johns Hopkins.
Marian Cline was born Aug. 23, 1923. Her family moved to South Florida two years later.
Krutulis graduated Miami Edison High School at the top of her class, and studied math and finance at the University of Miami. That’s where she met football player Joseph Krutulis, whom she married in 1942. As a young woman, Krutulis took a job as a substitute teacher at Shadowlawn School, and began raising her five children.
In the early 1950s, Krutulis began teaching full-time at St. James Lutheran School, and, later, Riviera Day School. Krutulis opened a small school for youngsters 3- to 5-years old at the St. Phillips Church school.
Krutulis reopened Gulliver Academy with close to 150 students in September 1954, nine months after she bought it from Arthur Gulliver.
“Words cannot begin to describe the sadness that thousands of students and alumni feel,” said Jeff Bartel a founding member of the board, current vice-chairman.
She is survived by her children: Barbara Holliman of Hiawassee, GA; Virginia of Evergreen, CO; Joseph J. of Anaheim, CA; Sharon Smith of Amelia, VA; and John W., in Miami.
Administrators at Gulliver are planning a “celebration of life” for Krutulis. The details have yet to be announced.
Eight years have passed since Michelle Spence-Jones was elected to the Miami City Commission.
She isn’t willing to leave just yet.
Spence-Jones — who was charged with bribery and grand theft in 2009, suspended from office, acquitted and reinstated to her post — is seeking reelection, she announced Friday. She represents District 5, which includes Overtown, Little Haiti and Liberty City.
Whether Spence-Jones could run again has been the subject of much debate. The Miami city charter limits commissioners to two terms and Spence-Jones has twice won election. But City Attorney Julie O. Bru opined that Spence-Jones could run again because her second term was interrupted by the suspension.
“Our charter prohibits a commissioner or the mayor for running for reelection after that commissioner or mayor has served two consecutive terms,” Bru reaffirmed to Spence-Jones at a City Commission meeting Thursday. “You are eligible to seek reelection because you did not serve two full consecutive terms.”
Spence-Jones’s opponent isn’t buying it.
“The bottom line is, Michelle is term limited,” said the Rev. Richard P. Dunn II, who held the commission seat in Spence-Jones’s absence. “She received financial compensation for the time she was away and she was fully vested in the pension. Are the citizens of Miami going to pay her twice?”
Dunn plans to file a legal challenge “immediately,” he said.
Spence-Jones wants the additional term, she said, “to finish what I started.”
She pointed to the improvements she’s spearheaded along Northeast Second Avenue in Little Haiti. “We cleaned the place up, repainted many of the buildings and recreated a Caribbean feel by adding steeples,” she said.
The ultimate goal, Spence-Jones said, is to make Little Haiti a destination for tourists akin to Little Havana’s Calle Ocho. She has a similar vision for Overtown, which was once the cultural hub of Miami’s black community. To that end, Spence-Jones pushed for improvements to Northwest Third Avenue and provided grant money for local businesses.
“Now we’re going to move forward with a marketing campaign and build relationships with cruise lines and tour operators,” Spence-Jones said. “But these sorts of things take time.”
Other big projects are in the works.
Earlier this year, Spence-Jones pushed through a $50 million bond issue for improvements in Overtown — the largest investment the blighted community has seen in decades. The money will go toward affordable housing and some retail projects.
But Spence-Jones takes an equal amount of pride in some of her smaller initiatives, including a project that brought Hollywood director Robert Townsend to Overtown to film an independent movie. Students from the University of Miami and several local high schools had the opportunity to serve as interns. The film will debut this summer.
She plans to focus future efforts on Liberty City. She is already laying the groundwork for a program that will train residents to become laboratory technicians. A second program will help people with criminal records pursue careers in the automotive industry.
Spence-Jones’s tenure has been somewhat of a rollercoaster. After being elected to her second term, she was charged with bribery and grand theft in two separate cases and removed from office by then-Gov. Charlie Crist. Jurors later acquitted her of bribery, and prosecutors dropped the grand-theft charges.
A vindicated Spence-Jones returned to City Hall in August with newfound political heft.
Spence-Jones is now suing Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernández Rundle and Miami Mayor Tomás Regalado, accusing them of conspiring to destroy her political career via the prosecutions. She declined to talk about the suit, saying only: “I’m going to let my lawyers fight that battle.”
She may have another legal fight ahead.
Dunn believes the city attorney’s opinion giving Spence-Jones the go-ahead to run again won’t withstand a legal challenge. He says Spence-Jones has served two consecutive terms because she was paid for two consecutive terms.
Dunn also criticized the city attorney, saying she likely felt pressured to give that opinion because Spence-Jones is her boss.
“If it stands up in a court of law, I will respect that,” said Dunn, who attended Thursday’s commission meeting and took notes on a legal pad. “But I’m not going to be whitewashed by a city attorney’s opinion that’s biased by her boss’s posturing position.”
Dunn, who also sat on the commission in the mid-‘90s after Commissioner Miller Dawkins was removed from office, pointed to his own accomplishments as a commissioner. He said he helped secure funding for Gibson Park,and quelled racial tensions after Miami police officers shot and killed seven black men in 2010 and 2011.
“Michelle Spence-Jones does not own that seat,” he said. “It’s owned by the people of District 5.”
No other candidates have announced they are running for the post.
A suspect accused of shooting a woman in the face after taking her purse in Liberty City was arrested Friday by Miami police.
Kamiah Lanier, 20, was charged with attempted murder, armed robbery with firearm, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and use of firearm during the commission of a felony.
At about 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Evelyn Matamoro was leaving Café Ruyi, a Chinese restaurant in the 5300 block of Northwest Seventh Avenue.
As she reached her car, a robber pointed a gun at her and made several statements, which Matamoro, the mother of two young children, didn’t understand because she doesn’t speak English, according to a Miami police arrest report.
Fearing for her life, Matamoro handed over her purse. The suspect then shot her once in the face, police said.
The suspect, who Matamoro later identified as Lanier, ran through the rear parking lot and escaped in a gray Dodge Charger driven by his sister, police said.
At about 7:45 p.m., a Miami officer stopped the car and arrested Lanier’s sister, who admitted picking up her brother but said she had no knowledge of the robbery and shooting.
At Jackson Ryder Trauma Center, where she remained in critical condition, Matamoro identified Lanier from a series of photographs. Police arrested him at 1:55 a.m. Friday.
He denied robbing Matamoro, according to police.
Matamoro was in stable condition Friday afternoon, said Miami police spokeswoman Kenia Reyes.
This report will be updated as more information becomes available.
Jurors on Thursday morning began deliberating in the Rilya Wilson murder case.
Twelve jurors will decide whether caretaker Geralyn Graham is guilty of killing the 4-year-old foster child, then telling a slew of lies to cover-up the child’s demise.
Graham, 67, is charged with aggravated child abuse, kidnapping and first degree murder. She faces life in prison. Jurors retired to begin deliberating at 10:45 a.m.
Defense lawyer Michael Matters, in his final argument Wednesday, ripped the state’s key witness, Robin Lunceford, a convicted armed robber who testified that Graham confessed in jail to smothering the girl with a pillow.
“Every bit of the story she concocted about my client is absolutely unbelievable,” Matters told jurors. “She graduated from prison life with a master in manipulation and a doctorate in deceit.”
Lunceford, an eccentric con who was doing life in prison, testified in exchange for a 10-year plea deal on armed robbery case.
The body of Rilya, whose disappearance sparked turmoil at the Florida Department of Children and Families, has never been found.
Miami-Dade prosecutor Sally Weintraub said Lunceford learned intimate details known only to a few people. That included an episode — backed up by other witness testimony — in which Graham grew angry because Rilya wanted to dress as Cleopatra, not an angel, for Halloween.
“Robin Lunceford is big, loud, aggressive, obscene, in-your-face, unpleasant. The kind of person you might just write off,” Weintraub told jurors. “How you feel about her is not what you have to consider … what the testimony is, the defendant’s words, that’s what you must consider.”
TALLAHASSEE --
Gov. Rick Scott says his proposed across-the-board pay raise for all full-time Florida teachers would cost nearly half a billion dollars next year. That would consume all of a tentative projected budget surplus of $437 million.
Scott said his plan would cost $480 million statewide. He declined to say what the percentage pay hike he’s recommending until he unveils the details at a Wednesday afternoon appearance at Ocoee Middle School near Orlando.
"I’ve traveled the state and I’ve talked to teachers," Scott told reporters. "They’re working tirelessly to make sure our students have achievement. I’m very appreciative of what our teachers do."
Scott said he remains supportive of a merit pay plan tied to student progress on standardized test scores. Merit pay became law two years ago but the state has provided no money for it and teachers are challenging it in court.
The governor’s call for an across-the-board pay increase for teachers will be a recommendation to the state Legislature, which writes the annual state budget.
TALLAHASSEE --
Gov. Rick Scott and the Florida Cabinet will be asked on Wednesday to agree to a no-bid contract to allow two major agriculture companies to farm on Everglades land for another 30 years, a deal that would include pouring tons of phosphorous-laden fertilizer onto the site the state is spending billions to clean-up.
The request from Florida Crystals and A. Duda and Sons is supported by the state Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Herschel Vinyard and South Florida Water Management District officials. But environmentalists aren’t happy.
“The State of Florida is putting 13,952 acres of state land off the table as a possible solution to future problems,’’ said Charles Lee, director of advocacy for Audubon of Florida at a meeting of the Cabinet aides last week. “It is passing up an opportunity.”
Environmentalists have agreed to allow Florida Crystals to continue sugar farming 7,862 acres in the Everglades Agricultural Area because they believe the company is “holding the state hostage” and won’t allow a crucial next step to go forward in the Everglades clean-up plan if they don’t get the deal.
But environmentalists strongly oppose the Duda deal, which would allow that company to continue to grow vegetables farm 6,089 acres of land and pump 339 tons of fertilizer each year into the Everglades, exacerbating the clean-up problem the state is spending billions to fix. They want the state to require Duda to reduce its phosphorous run-off in exchange for the favorable no-bid contract.
According to emails obtained by the Miami Herald/Tampa Bay Times Tallahassee bureau, Tracy Peters of the Division of State Lands initially suggested that Florida Crystals reduce its pollution levels in exchange for the lease extension. But the attorney for the company, Silvia Morell Alderman of Akerman Senterfitt, responded that such requirements “would be deal breakers” because the company has been improving its phosphorous levels for 17 years.
Peters then backed off and, on several occasions, asked Alderman’s permission to make other minor changes to the proposal, the emails show.
Under a 1994 Everglades Forever Act, the companies were to give 20-year leases to farm land in the Everglades Agricultural Area in exchange for reducing polluted run-off that is choking the Everglades. The proposal to be voted on by the governor and Cabinet Wednesday will extend five of those leases, which are set to expire between 2015 and 2018, and allow them to continue for another 30 years.
In September, Scott formally signed off on $880 million worth of Everglades cleanup projects that will expand efforts to stem the flow of polluted farm, ranch and yard runoff into the famed River of Grass. The agreement between the state, sugar growers and the Environmental Protection Agency, would allow the state to move forward with building stormwater treatment projects and meet a series of discharge limits beginning in 2018.
Lee told the Cabinet aides that the state may not have the legal authority to negotiate the lease renewal in the first place but, if it does, it should attempt to reduce phosphorous loads onto the land. A similar deal was cut three years ago when the state renewed agricultural leases as part of a land-purchase deal with U.S. Sugar and the company agreed to reduce phosphorous levels on the land in exchange for the deal.
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