Who’s at fault when internet celebrities become targets of real-life harassment? Are they victims of their own narcissism? What about when they’re under the age of consent? Last week’s New Times feature (“Lonely Lolita,” Allie Conti, October 10) looked at what happens to a young girl when she achieves pseudo-fame…

Who’s at fault when internet celebrities become targets of real-life harassment? Are they victims of their own narcissism? What about when they’re under the age of consent? For our cover story this week, New Times looked at what happens to a young girl when she achieves pseudo-fame online. We profiled…

Loli-chan is a modern-day Rapunzel locked inside a South Miami fortress of rust and weeds on a dead-end street. She rarely leaves a guest house that sits in a jungle-like yard overrun with six peacocks and half as many junked cars. Ten paces away is her parents’ place. Wooden boards…

Five weeks ago, Diana Nyad completed her historic 53-hour swim from Havana to Key West. But days after Nyad crawled onto the Keys gasping for breath, internet interlocutors raised doubts that the 63-year-old actually completed her lifelong dream. Members of MarathonSwimmers.org claimed she cheated at the 30-hour mark by climbing…

Will people believe anything regarding money when the economy’s tanked? We’re starting to think so. In July 2008, Debra Saafield gave Zena the Clairvoyant $27,000 as a trust exercise. The Naples woman was told that her attachment to material objects was a holdover from her past as an Egyptian princess,…

Hunt will plead no contest to two counts of misdemeanor battery, misdemeanor contributing to the dependency of a child, and two counts of felony interference with child custody.

The Health Insurance Marketplace ostensibly opened yesterday. Beginning at midnight, Americans could create an account and shop for coverage plans that would go into effect at the beginning of next year. The operative word here being “ostensibly.” Somehow the biggest hindrance to the rolling out of Obamacare wasn’t a policy…

It’s been a while since Christopher Wayne’s seen the spotlight. In 2010, the Wall Street Journal profiled the Ft. Lauderdale osteopath who’s prone to wearing CBGB shirts and spiking his bleach blonde hair. The write-up noted that he hangs with Paris Hilton and Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler, not to mention a…

By the time Ronnie Pelham makes his third U-turn on North Kendall Drive, he’s visibly frustrated. The directions to the Dead Drop are vague, and his GPS keeps telling him to retrace the same 300-foot stretch with his silver Hyundai. Finally, the 31-year-old notices a strip-mall alleyway lined with dumpsters…

We wonder if she saw it coming. Rose Marks, a 62-year-old South Florida “psychic,” was found guilty of 14 fraud counts yesterday. The gypsy matriarch swindled Ft. Lauderdale and New York residents out of nearly $25 million, the Palm Beach Post reports. Marks had a brilliant idea: If you can…

Historically speaking, Marizel Almirall was not the first adolescent to ever feel “different.” Nor did she pioneer the concept of the black-clad teenage outcast. But the South Beach native might be the only person in the world who can say she tattooed a large upside-down cross on herself at age…

Remember when four kids under the watch of the Department of Children and Families were found dead in June and July? Overworked and understaffed employees at the agency repeatedly deemed the living situations of youngsters safe when clearly things were far from it. The whole scenario caused chief administrator David…

Raymond Francois is a semi-retired driver who doesn’t miss his days piloting a yellow Crown Victoria for Miami Dade Taxi. The 47-year-old Haitian used to leave the house before his kids woke up and come back after they had already gone back to sleep each night. He claims that many…

Historically speaking, Marizel Almirall was not the first adolescent to ever feel “different.” Nor did she pioneer the concept of the black-clad teenage outcast. But the South Beach-native might be the only person in the world who can say she tattooed a large upside-down cross on herself at age 13…

A distinguished, handsome Italian gentleman saunters into a Miami Beach tattoo shop that’s drenched in purple neon light. He’s out of place in multiple ways. First off, it’s a hot July evening, and he’s bundled up in a long beige scarf. Second, he’s dressed straight out of GQ with his…

The first thing you notice when approaching Candelo Kimbisa’s house in Hialeah is the Marlboro Red smoke that swirls around the porch and clogs his foyer. “Don’t worry,” he says, proffering a cigarette with a smile that reveals three gold teeth. “Spirits love tobacco.” Although the back half of the…

The first thing you notice when approaching Candelo Kimbisa’s house in Hialeah is the Marlboro Red smoke that swirls around the porch and clogs his foyer. “Don’t worry,” he says, proffering a cigarette with a smile that reveals three gold teeth. “Spirits love tobacco.” Although the back half of the…

A distinguished, handsome Italian gentleman saunters into a Miami Beach tattoo shop that’s drenched in purple neon light. He’s out of place in multiple ways. First off, it’s a hot July evening, and he’s bundled up in a long beige scarf. Second, he’s dressed straight out of GQ with his…

It’s easy to get sad while perusing CraigsList. A quick stroll through Casual Encounters proves how depraved humankind can be. Almost every page is plastered with reminders to be wary of scams. But one entry that appeared earlier this month intrigued us with its title: “Do you believe in Happiness????????????”…

In almost every episode of A&E’s Hoarders, a single animal pulled from the mass of heaping garbage is paraded as a symbol. It’s both a trope and testament to the hoarder’s insanity that a living creature could be buried under detritus, going undetected until the network’s intervention. But in a…