Generally I’m no fan of lawyers. And as a rule I’d say we live in society that is far too litigious. But show me a lawsuit in which one lawyer is suing another lawyer, in which both lawyers are high-profile county hall lobbyists, and damn it, that’s a cause of…
Off with Its Heads!Miami corruption gives new meaning to the phrase Herculean effort: Thanks to Tristram Korten’s dogged efforts, a spotlight has remained on the corruption that exists within the bail-bonds industry (“Justice, Bloody Justice,” October 5). Hopefully the State Attorney’s Office will be taking action on the information it…
For Scott Souther it’s been a long day in the office. As a booking agent with the Boston-area International Music Network, Souther is responsible for setting up the North American tours for Cuba’s most in-demand artists: the family of musicians known as the Buena Vista Social Club. He’s also just…
Miami, the City That Eats Its YoungThat’s what Wasserman gets for mouthing off: After reading Tristram Korten’s interview with Daily Business Review editor in chief Ed Wasserman (“The Last Iconoclast,” September 28), I must ask why is it that South Florida regularly seems to ship out its best and brightest?…
Arriving in Miami with his family as an eighteen-year-old punk rocker, Brook Dorsch fondly recalls the state of South Beach in the Eighties. “The Beach was my stomping ground,” he says. “The Dead Kennedys at the Cameo, Jane’s Addiction at Woody’s, Rat Bastard’s shows, Charlie Pickett, F. I can still…
School Board Welcomes Ethically Challenged District reaches out to those in need: It is extremely discouraging, though hardly surprising, that Demetrio J. Perez stands a good chance of being elected to the Miami-Dade County School Board in the run-off election this November, as Robert Andrew Powell reported in “Like Father,…
In the interest of full disclosure, I should acknowledge I didn’t care for the Cub Scouts. My den mother was the wife of my Little League baseball coach, and while she was probably a good woman, at the time I thought she was a thief who was squirreling away my…
“I knew he had something to do with my motherfuckin’ cousin gettin’ killed!” X-Con snarls into his cell phone. “I’m gonna get the motherfucker!” His back turned to Kulchur, X-Con drops the phone to his side and gazes out ominously at Biscayne Bay from behind 79th Street’s Crab House restaurant…
Welcome to Miami, Where Homophobia Is a Matter of PolicyThey doth protest too much, sayeth Jorge: After reading Lissette Corsa’s articles about the code-enforcement board’s harassment of Lambda Passages bookstore, I am convinced that the era of witch-hunts is not over in our backward city (“Instantly Illegal,” September 14 and…
Every Sunday for the past ten years, Art Buonamia and his wife, Marisa, drove from their home in Kendall to attend Mass at the Shrine of Saint Philomena Church in Little Havana. “They still do the Mass in Latin,” explains Buonamia, an Italian from New York who moved to Miami…
“Finally, after so many years, I’m making the kind of money and receiving the kind of accolades I deserve,” reports Detroit’s seminal techno DJ Derrick May. That should please him, right? So why isn’t he smiling? From this present vantage point — reclining with a glass of wine in a…
Not the Times and not Vanity Fair, Perhaps But not bad for a throwaway rag: Wow! All I can say is thank you to Celeste Fraser Delgado for her incredible article about Manolín (“The Salsa Doctor Is Out,” September 14). It was fantastically researched and written, very much of the…
Living Proof That No One Is PrefectFlawed free weekly fesses up: As a dedicated reader of New Times since the late Eighties, I enjoy your paper each week, especially given the deplorable condition of “professional” dailies in Miami. So what the heck happened with the September 7 cover? The subhead…
The Buena Vista Social Club’s wrinkled musical veterans may still be basking in critical hosannas and standing ovations as they continue their tours of the United States, Europe, and Japan, but back in Havana the cultural czars are turning downright bitchy. Two weeks ago Granma, the official newspaper of the…
At Long Last Busted The effort to bring felony charges against Manuel Diaz was fraught with innuendo, suspicion, and an alleged conflict of interest By Tristram Korten Your Honor, the Defense RestsCrime and politics and Mr. Diaz: Along with attorney Thomas Tew, I represent Manuel Diaz in the pending criminal…
“Is it too late on a Friday night to talk about Hegel?” That was the question put by celebrity author Tom Wolfe to the well-heeled crowd of several hundred gathered before him inside Overtown’s Ice Palace studios two weeks ago. In certain circles such a quip might have produced a…
The Not Ready for Prime Time Mayor Who can forget the night Alex Penelas made an ass of himself By Jim DeFede Free Weekly Dupes Gullible ReadersElian saga unmasks insidious conspiracy: I was completely disgusted by Jim DeFede’s article “The Not Ready for Prime Time Mayor” (August 24). Despite being…
Despite what most people probably believe, the defining moment of Alex Penelas’s tenure as Miami-Dade County mayor was not that infamous press conference in front of the federal courthouse on March 29. Certainly his conduct that day was revelatory of his character, or lack of it. Standing outside the courthouse,…
Revenge of the Penny Tax FIU and MDCC foundations draw new scrutiny from state investigators By Jim DeFede Our Hallowed Institutions of Higher ChurningMoney Laundering 101 makes the grade: In response to Jim DeFede’s column “Revenge of the Penny Tax” (August 17), and on behalf of the Colombian-American Democratic Council,…
Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle has asked the governor to appoint a special prosecutor to review allegations that the presidents of Florida International University and Miami-Dade Community College violated the state’s campaign finance laws during last year’s failed effort to raise the sales tax by a penny in order…
The Wimp Gary Dellapa’s retirement from MIA comes not a moment too soon By Jim DeFede Merrett Speaks Up for MeritIf Dellapa were such a loser, I’d have booted him long ago: I can’t think of anything good that was accomplished by Jim DeFede’s mean-spirited article on Miami-Dade County aviation…
Forget about smoke-filled backroom deals, angry convention-floor fights, or black-bandanna-clad anarchists running through the streets. Right now, on a sweltering August afternoon in mid-Miami Beach, the campaign trail is pretty uneventful. Alvaro Fernandez and his girlfriend, Patricia Bravo Segall, are working their way door to door up Alton Road, and…
