Donald Bermudez first heard about the sacred freshwater spring from the widow Mary King, who lived across the street. He was just a boy back then, but he’d befriended many of the old folks in Southside, and they spun tales for him of the mysteries of the land. In those…
Ignacio Fiterre is about as unlikely a candidate to assault a police officer as one could find. The 52-year-old well-dressed industrial engineer is short and pudgy, his thinning hair a distinguished shade of gray — hardly the image of a menace to society. In his spare time, in fact, he…
It’s the year 2018 and business is booming in the Homestead area. The two-runway commercial airport at the former air force base is the landing spot of choice for tens of thousands of cargo and passenger flights each year. And the long-awaited ancillary development around the base is proceeding apace…
Hurricane Andrew assaulted Susan Alberti’s Saga Bay neighborhood with shattering winds and a twelve-foot storm surge. When she and her husband Louis returned to their home, east of Cutler Ridge off Old Cutler Road, they found water lines on the walls higher than their two young children’s heads, carpets caked…
Venezuelan citizen Guillermo Pena works as a district manager for the Falk Corporation, one of several subsidiaries of the multibillion-dollar manufacturer Sundstrand. Milwaukee-based Falk builds and sells industrial power-transmission equipment. Its Website advertises the company’s products for use in coal mines, paper mills, chemical plants, and oil refineries worldwide. On…
When Nathaniel Burke is not in his Little Havana office, a machine answers the phone. “Thank you for calling the Coalition to Support Cuban Detainees,” a recording of Burke’s voice begins. It then repeats the message in Spanish and adds, “If you are in prison, please leave your complete address.”…
It’s 1:35 a.m. and Eunice Liberty is on the phone, fuming with anger. “I didn’t work all these years to be treated like this,” protests the 93-year-old, who, despite her advanced age, is decidedly more alert than the bleary-eyed reporter on the other end of the line. The object of…
A product of three generations of northern Italian restaurateurs, Maurizio Farinelli came to the United States in 1989 with the dream of opening his own eatery. First he toiled as a busboy to raise enough money for English classes. Having learned the language, he worked his way up through the…
At a little after 8:00 a.m. on Sunday, September 7, more than half a dozen City of Miami police cars are parked in front of an abandoned building on a quiet corner in Overtown. Boxed in by a Florida Power & Light substation, the structure at 470 NW Eleventh St…
It is unlikely that Simpson v. the City of Miami will turn into the trial of the century. Yet in the same way O.J. Simpson’s case helped place the issue of domestic violence before the public, so a recent court decision on behalf of another Simpson could change the way…
The carnage began at NE 99th Street. They came with chain saws and wood chippers. Blocking off one lane of traffic along Biscayne Boulevard, the three men hacked and sawed for nearly three weeks, working their way south through Miami Shores. When they were done, the long row of majestic,…
On the morning of August 5, Cuban state security officials arrived at Havana’s Jose Marti International Airport. Their orders were simple: Make sure that two of the country’s best-known independent journalists and their wives boarded a United States-bound plane to exile. The journalists, Lazaro Lazo and Olance Nogueras, had said…
A stack of pamphlets entitled “Citizens Guide to County Accountability” sits on the desk of Eduardo Diaz, executive director of Dade’s Independent Review Panel (IRP). The brochures explain how this little-known agency uses fact-finding and dispute resolution to reconcile complaints against Dade County departments or employees, including Metro police officers…
What do Bob Marley, the Girl Scouts, Ivana Trump, and the American Welding Society have in common? All have been honored this year with their own official “day” by Dade County and/or the City of Miami. In fact, in a flurry of bond paper and fancy script, the city has…
Ask any toll clerk on the Florida Turnpike extension for directions to Everglades National Park and they will likely include a fruit stand called Robert Is Here among the stoplights and the right turns. The establishment at SW 192nd Avenue and Palm Drive, just west of Florida City and east…
