A ruddy-faced man in jeans, polo shirt, baseball cap, and padded ear protectors carries a thick-barrel assault rifle to a field bordered by trees, swamp brush, and a twenty-foot-high dirt berm. Under bright sunlight, he lifts the gun to his shoulder and gets a fix through the scope. He leans…
When Lisa Cox staged her weekly “Girls in the Night” event earlier this month, everything ran smoothly. Women boogied with women to a thumping disco beat. Above the bar, silent videos featuring topless females cycled endlessly. A few girls made out in a dark corner. There was only one problem:…
Seminole Indian chief James Billie, dressed in traditional multicolor jersey and snakeskin boots, is dropping fast from two miles above the earth toward his target — a windblown airport runway in Tallahassee. The man sitting next to him in the copilot’s seat, an old friend of mixed Creek Indian and…
For more for than two years now I’ve been conversing with three very different men. One is probably the most respected federal judge in South Florida, the second a diplomat with a guilty conscience. And these two are linked by the story of the third, former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega…
On the afternoon of Sunday, March 8, Metro-Dade police responded to a report of illegal dumping at Chapman Field Park, a South Dade haven for softball players and nature lovers. Ofcr. Zane Jones drove his squad car past the baseball diamonds, past two unlocked and open gates, and down a…
The people who oversee high school athletic competition in Dade County are investigating allegations of wrongdoing by the Miami High School basketball program. “We want [Miami High] to respond to a series of questions — to our administration and our school board as well as to interested parties in our…
Cesar Odio’s 83-year-old mother is dying of cancer. Lawyers for the incarcerated former Miami city manager, arguing “humanitarian need,” say that he should be released from jail early in order to visit her. “The defendant’s mother, Sarah Odio … is currently suffering from a carcinoma (cancer) and has an invasive…
It was bad enough that Michelle had to pee in front of strangers in the Orange County jail cell. The Miami woman couldn’t get ahold of the narcotic she had used daily for nearly fifteen years, and she suffered severe withdrawal symptoms. To rise out of bed without putting pressure…
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…
Fasten your helmet. Grab a mallet. Arm your pony with breast plates. The polo wars are about to begin: A group of Venezuelan investors led by an Egyptian oil analyst want to build an exclusive polo club and equestrian center on a stretch of Dade County wetlands environmentalists claim are…
After a good four years of terrorizing dance club denizens, the macarena finally appears to be dead. The same, unfortunately, cannot be said of its legacy. Hoping to cash in on the line-dance craze, rum baron Bacardi, with the help of salsa singer Willy Chirino and a squad of Miami…
Sonia Gonzalez leads her three-year-old daughter down an unlighted flight of wooden stairs and out the front door of their apartment building into the dazzling sun over Havana, fiery even in January. Her face set in grim concentration, she unfolds a borrowed stroller and tells the child, Sonia Maria Elizondo,…
Attorneys John Shubin and Jeffrey Bass argue that any pending waterfront project that has been granted “design bonuses” increasing its size should be put to a citywide vote. Here’s a list of development projects that could be affected, according to the city’s planning department: *Ocean Parcel, Ocean Drive and Biscayne…
John Shubin runs his law practice out of a squat four-story building near the downtown Miami Burdines, and he lives in Coral Gables, but right now he is the hottest attorney in Miami Beach. Along with his partner Jeffrey Bass, Shubin has, during the past year, become the legal catalyst…
It’s the barricade from hell: a berm of earth stretching across NE Seventh Avenue at 80th Street, framed by freshly poured concrete curbs and landscaped with languishing bougainvillea and miniature palms. Who could have imagined that this innocuous street closure would ignite an ugly war in Miami’s Upper Eastside neighborhood…
O captain, my captain. Your ship is a life-threatening safety hazard to the Port of Miami and has been since last spring. So despite your political connections and your plans to reap profits, get your boat out of our water. So might read the lament of the Miami Coast Guard…
Name: Udonis Haslem Grade: Senior Home School: Miramar High (Broward County) How Attend Miami High: Took Miami address at home of booster Sylbrin Robinson Senior Central Majority to Minority (M&M) transfer Name: Antonio Latimer Grade: Senior Home School: Miami High How Attend Miami High: A transfer from Puerto Rico, he…
On a chilly Saturday afternoon in February, the Miami Art Museum bustles with visitors who zigzag through a posthumous survey of Carlos Alfonzo’s work, taking in the bright-color, densely painted canvases that made the Cuban artist a favorite among local collectors a decade ago. Unfailingly, when they reach the last…
A few million gallons of ink and half a forest of newsprint have been devoted to stories about the little pamphlet that recently circulated around Killian High School. No doubt about it, the story has been worth at least the amount of coverage it’s getting. Nine high school students were…
When Dave Fisher proudly held up a gold-painted coconut, a group of twenty men and one woman broke into applause, whooped, and swilled beer. He and the rest of the Fort Lauderdale Area Brewers (FLAB) had just won the first annual Coconut Cup and would soon be taking the gilded…
Udonis Haslem made a name for himself in Jacksonville. In only two seasons the starting power forward for the Wolfson Wolfpack high school basketball team established himself as one of the best big men in the state, earning a spot on the Jacksonville All-Stars traveling squad. Teammates say Haslem’s sure…
North Miami’s Audio Vision Studios is bristling with brass. Squeezed inside a tiny recording studio is Duffy Jackson’s nine-piece swing ensemble. After a count-off from Jackson, a rotund drummer, the band rips into “Tiny’s Blues,” a 50-year-old tune that Jackson has updated with a funk beat. The trumpets, saxes, and…
