Former Miami Beach cop Lavont Flanders was one of two men convicted last week of drugging seven women and raping them on camera to make porno flicks. But his lawyer says that, despite his client’s public fall from grace, Flanders is no criminal.”These girls knew exactly what they were getting…
When the Miami Art Museum announced it was renaming itself for real estate mogul Jorge Perez, people lost their minds. It wasn’t just that the new acronym, PAMM, sounds more like a cooking spray than an art collection. No, people were really pissed off because Perez only forked over an…
Cops hear the stupidest excuses from people trying to get off the hook. Which is why it’s surprising that Fernando Villa, the Miami-Dade police officer arrested Tuesday for allegedly falling asleep drunk behind the wheel of his squad car, couldn’t come up with a better explanation for failing his roadside…
Update: According to his arrest report, Villa blamed his sluggish responses on a concussion he suffered at least 13 years ago while playing high school baseball.It’s hard to believe after ATV crashes and poop smeared squad cars, but Miami law enforcement hit a new low on Tuesday.That’s when cops discovered…
Susan Miller is mad as hell and she ain’t going to take it any more.The Key West resident has filed a class-action lawsuit against Delta for its “illegal” and “outrageous” lost luggage policy, claiming that the airline lost her bags and then lied to her about reimbursements to which she…
Home-built aircraft thrill and kill
If you thought the Port of Miami’s deep dredging project was controversial, get a load of this.Riptide has obtained a copy of the port’s 2035 Master Plan. It calls for adding three new cruise ship berths, a mega-yacht marina near downtown, and a seven-story “multi-modal center” with hotels, retail, entertainment,…
Samuel Beckett once said: “Fail again. Fail better.”Waiting for Godot must be a best seller among county cops. Just a week after the Broward Sheriffs announced that they were scrapping a much-touted $500,000 gunshot detection system because… um, it didn’t really work, Miami-Dade police say they are currently installing a…
Woah, Nelly. Horse slaughter is once again legal thanks to Congress.Florida currently has some of the toughest laws against horse slaughter in the nation, but activists disagree over whether the practice could soon be booming in the Sunshine State.”If someone were to open a licensed slaughter house in Florida and…
September’s fatal shooting at Nocturnal got us wondering: What really goes on behind the velvet ropes in Miami’s most chichi clubs? Our sickly journalist physique hardly qualified us to infiltrate the tanned and Ed Hardy-clad world, so instead we requested 12 months of police reports from one SoBe hot spot:…
Stripteases, sexual favors, booze, porn mags, and fat stacks of cash would be run-of-the-mill in many Miami strip clubs. But at downtown’s maximum security Federal Detention Center? Multiple attorneys interviewed by Riptide say the FDC visitor rooms have been taken over by South American pole dancers posing as paralegals for…
Stripteases, sexual favors, booze, porn mags, and fat stacks of cash would be run-of-the-mill in many Miami strip clubs. But at downtown’s maximum security Federal Detention Center?Multiple attorneys interviewed by Riptide say the FDC visitor rooms have been taken over by South American pole dancers posing as paralegals for wealthy…
Faced with up to two years of underwater blasting that they say will forever scar Biscayne Bay, local environmentalists played their last card yesterday to stop the Port of Miami “Deep Dredge” project: They sued.Now a judge will determine whether the Florida Department of Environmental Protection followed proper procedures to…
Enrique Gomez de Molina’s sculptures are to die for. Literally.The Miami-based artist was charged today with illegally smuggling exotic animal parts — including birds of paradise and the world’s cutest animal, a slow loris — into Florida from Indonesia. Then he stitched, glued, and stuffed the parts together into Frankenstein’s…
September’s fatal shooting at Nocturnal got us wondering: What really goes on behind the velvet ropes in Miami’s most chichi clubs? Our sickly journalist physique hardly qualified us to infiltrate the tanned and Ed Hardy-clad world, so instead we requested 12 months of police reports from one SoBe hot spot:…
If you’ve been out drinking downtown lately and stumbled upon a street corner bursting with neon-colored weeds, don’t worry: It’s not an acid trip gone wrong.It’s weed bombing.”We’re tired of living in a big dump overrun with weeds and trash,” says chief bombadier Brad Knoefler, owner of downtown club Grand…
Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk: Urbane Planners
Orietta de Luque: Colombiana Caliente
Did you know that the EPA can now fine you if your house’s septic tank is dirty? Or that the EPA now requires toilet paper be made from synthetic materials instead of traditional wood fiber? And that the government agency is banning animal fat from soap?Actually, that’s all bullshit. But those…
For years, someone calling himself “The Weedmanhippy” has been wedging cryptic, self-promoting fliers into the front of New Times boxes across Miami Beach. At first, we were kind of annoyed. Then, earlier this week, we finally gave in and called him.The Weedmanhippy is actually Billy Blank: part SoBe Socrates, part…
As the NBA lockout drags on, fears grow that local stars like Dwayne Wade and LeBron James will spend the next nine months playing overseas or, even worse, on weird tours through the Midwest. LeBron has even hinted that he might swap the hardcourt for the gridiron.But will he go…
A bloody uprising tears through a small, resource-rich country. A leader emerges, promising an end to years of elitist, white rule and the beginning of a new socialist utopia. But instead of relinquishing power, that leader becomes a strongman, an authoritarian… a dictator.Cuba? No, this is the story of Zimbabwe…
