Back in July 1998, Pensacola prosecutors issued an arrest warrant for a 28-year-old father of three named Antonio Monroy. He had been charged with three counts of cocaine trafficking. Soon he was picked up in Miami. He was sent to a federal prison in Coleman, Florida, northwest of Orlando, and…
When the Miami-Dade County Elections Department announced that it would put its touch-screen electronic voting machines through a “rigorous test” today, I pictured a real-life cast of traditionally disenfranchised voters: A self-proclaimed Luddite; someone with only hooks for hands; a couple of elderly folks with a record of butterfly ballots;…
Loft 3 Miami Vision Blogarama! has a post today handing something called its “Big Idea Award” to Jorge Perez, CEO of the Related Group, for Loft 3, “the first really affordable workforce housing in downtown Miami that you would actually want to live in.” Units in the 32-story, 495-condo tower…
Maria Now in her fourth year as host of one of Telemundo’s most popular and critically-respected programs, Al Rojo Vivo con Mar�a Celeste, Maria Celeste Arraras is certainly entitled to act all Katie Couric if she wants to, detaining airplanes and menacing her minions. Yet Arraras is so unassuming and…
Lyssa Oberkreser Lauren Frances shows off her Ph. Double Ds The lure of gift bags once again pried my bottom from my Pottery Barn sofa and away from my daunting stack of library books. Monday night’s party was for the launch of Victoria’s Secret (901 Lincoln Rd., Miami Beach) Very…
Yes Yes Yes Pompano Beach can be an eerie and uncomfortable place for the Miami traveler. Piles of boats glisten menacingly in harsh parking lot floodlights and pick-up trucks roll along Sample Road, their exteriors plastered with Hooters bumper stickers and creative arrangements of stars and bars. But the Yeah…
From The Dirt Miami “Fresh on the heels of reading in Rollingstone that Scissor Sister’s lead singer Jack Shears told off FYE at a recent National Association of Recording Merchandisers convention for pricing CD’s too high at $20 bucks a pop, what do we see? That our beloved Specs of…
This on the monster, multi-million dollar project on 36th Street at North Miami Avenue from Transit Miami “A town center has become in my mind a euphemism for a Nimby-like community which is giving a half-assed attempt to create an urban culture, with sufficient parking for all Mercedes Benzes of…
The sun shone bright and hot just before noon on a perfect July 4 when 35-year-old Samuel Sax took off from Tamiami Airport in his 1946 Globe Swift. There wasn’t a dreary storm cloud in the sky. He made his way north in the nimble single-engine two-seater, cruising over Key…
On October 24, 2004, following a six-day trial in federal court, Ofelia Canals won a major victory against her former employer and one of the most powerful institutions in South Florida: the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Miami. A jury believed her contention that archdiocesan officials asked her to commit perjury…
Douglas Road Goes Off the (Metro) Rails Filed under: Scanner In 2003 the Miami-Dade County Commission selected Miami banker and real estate developer Raul Masvidal to build on county-owned property near the Douglas Road Metrorail station. Masvidal and his partners, Pinnacle Housing and Royal Group Investments, promised a parking garage,…
From Critical Miami: “Here we are, then—a half a billion or so dollars and a couple of decades later, and our performing arts center is open at last. Let’s first stop and acknowledge something: The center will present many amazing shows in the future. The Miami Art Museum and Science…
Florida Governor Jeb Bush, who’s pledged to return to Miami when his term ends in January 2007, took a leisurely stroll through the brick-lined streets of downtown Pittsburgh last week. He must have marveled at the colors and smells of the early autumn evening in the quaint Northeast. It was…
Not long ago, Miami Herald executive editor Tom Fiedler apologized for comparing the newspaper’s critics on Spanish language radio to nipping Chihuahuas. This has created a cottage industry among the little mutts. Chuck Strouse Ay Chihuahua Ay Chihuahua 2…
Courtney Cunningham The former Mrs. Juan Courtney Cunningham has parted ways with her Republican lobbyist husband. To the alimony tune of $11,500 per month. Kitty Cunningham, 44, began divorce proceedings against her 44-year-old husband,of the Coral Gables-based Barreto, Cunningham and May public affairs firm, in April 2005 saying their marriage…
We at Miami New Times missed the Foley boat. Like an itinerant hurricane, the electronic misadventures of Mark “Fingers” Foley blew north through Broward and Palm Beach Counties, leaving us out of the path of what ABC news has taken to calling “The Perfect Blogstorm.” But you know what America?…
The apology by Miami Herald Executive Editor Tom Fiedler in this morning’s newspaper was among the strangest things I have ever read in my life. On the front page, with his picture, he apologized for using “an unfortunate term” in a staff meeting. He didn’t say what the comment was…
Me and Jamie Lee We’re a jaded bunch here at the Miami New Times. Our city has been a celebrity mecca for so long that the antics of the rich and famous no longer hold much fascination. But celebrities who actually use their fame to positive ends always pique our…
On June 25, 1995, Adham Amin Hassoun, a computer programmer, talked on the phone from his home in Sunrise to Kassem Daher, head of the Canadian Islamic Association: “Our friend in the first region … has opened up a soccer field over there because there are matches…. He wants only…
A college dropout with twenty years of reporting experience and a Pulitzer Prize on his resumé, Gary Webb broke the biggest story of his career in August 1996, when he published “Dark Alliance,” a three-part series for the San Jose Mercury News that linked the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency to…
No Wham! No Bam! Thank You, MAM Filed under: Culture Local politicos sighed with relief this past week as years of delays, cost overruns, and questionable judgment calls came to an end with the raising of the curtain at the Carnival Center for the Performing Arts, north of downtown. While…
What does $461 million buy? A top-of-the-line performing arts center? Yes! Parking? No. Ladies and gentlemen, enjoy your stroll to the concert hall through one of Miami’s choicest neighborhoods, where street drama rivals the action onstage. This season’s highlights include 44 stolen cars, 71 robberies, 134 assaults, and a slew…
