Lead Stories *In February Michael Knowles, awaiting trial in Virginia for killing his wife, filed a $100 million lawsuit against advice columnist Ann Landers, charging that she had defamed him by publishing his letter on how tough the Internet can be on marriages. Wrote Knowles: “Today is my wife’s 44th…
Lead Stories *In April the town council of Cambre, Spain, conferred legal, marriagelike status on nontraditional unions, but controversy still raged over a couple that was not even of the same sex. The precipitating event was the recent nuptials of Daniel Pena and his sister Rosa Moya Pena, who have…
Political Consultants and Other Villains In Robert Andrew Powell’s story regarding Miami Beach City Manager Jose Garcia-Pedrosa (“The Autocrat,” May 1), you referred to me both in the text of the story and in the caption to my photograph as a “political consultant.” Quite frankly, I deem this attribution libelous,…
There is an old Irish toast: May you be in Heaven an hour before the devil even knows you’re dead. Former Miami mayor Steve Clark was a great fan of Irish toasts — as well as Scandinavian toasts, Italian toasts, Russian toasts, Cuban toasts, and pretty much any toast that…
Lead Stories *The Times of London reported in March that when an employee of the James Beauchamp law firm in Edgbaston, England, recently killed himself, the firm billed his mother about $20,000 for their expenses. Included was a bill for about $2300 for another employee to go to his home…
Thank You for Ruining My Wedding I find it somewhat humorous when I hear or read about Loring Frank, as I did in Ray Martinez’s article “Rabbi with a Cause” (April 17). My husband and I once availed ourselves of Loring Frank’s services, and all we have left is bitter,…
The E. Howard Hunt Grading Curve Concerning Jim Kelly’s mostly excellent article on the CIA’s South Florida presence(“The Fidel Fixation,”April 17), I’m sorry he didn’t check with me about the alleged “wild and all-too-public night on the town” involving Guatemalan exiles. If it ever took place, I was not involved…
Lead Stories *Family values: In March the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that a local woman, age 66, and her husband are searching for a surrogate mother for their deceased son’s sperm so that they can fulfill their longing to be grandparents. And three days earlier, a Milan, Italy, newspaper reported…
When Sal Magluta goes on trial later this year for bail jumping, it’s too bad he won’t be able to plead temporary insanity. He’d get off for sure. After all, what jury wouldn’t believe that Magluta was just a few ounces short of a kilo when he walked away from…
During HABDI’s regular monthly board of directors meeting in March, Augustine Ajagbe announced his desire to add to the seven-member panel Dick Judy, the controversial former aviation director for Dade County. Although it looked like Ajagbe’s proposal, several other board members suspected it was really the handiwork of HABDI’s president,…
Lead Stories *The Nashville Tennessean reported in February about state government engineer Ken Robichaux’s lonely, ten-year crusade to wipe out both the U.S. system of measurement and the metric system, in favor of one that combines weight, length, and volume into a single set of measures denominated as (not surprisingly)…
We Love Art, We Just Don’t Want to Pay for It Judy Cantor’s article regarding the arts in Miami Beach (“Everybody’s a Critic,” April 3) indicated that the city’s public officials are doing little to support the Art in Public Places Committee and its initiatives. I take this opportunity to…
Yet More SoBe Snobbery I want to respond to Kirk Semple’s article “South Beach Goes Palm Beach” (April 3). The Ocean Drive business people who started this campaign against Carnival Miami South Beach are guilty of plain old snobbiness, if not outright racism. Perhaps they couldn’t deal with the fact…
Lead Stories *Saddam Hussein filed a libel suit in February in Paris against the magazine Le Nouvel Observateur for its September 1996 story in which he was referred to by other Arab leaders as, among other things, an “executioner,” a “monster,” a “murderer,” “a perfect cretin,” and a “noodle.” *In…
The Miami Heat is in the midst of its finest season ever. The team, under the leadership of coach Pat Riley, has secured a spot in the playoffs and is on the verge of winning the Atlantic Division for the first time in the franchise’s nine-year history. Attendance for Miami’s…
Lead Stories *Kurt Irons, age 28, was arrested in December in Wausau, Wisconsin, and charged with vehicular homicide. Reportedly, Irons was driving a stolen truck after drinking heavily and crashed into another truck, killing a 37-year-old woman. According to the Marathon County sheriff’s report, Irons was surprised that he was…
Hoop Themes Thanks to Robert Andrew Powell for a slam dunk with his superb article on Jack Shaber (“Mr. Basketball,” March 27). Shaber is a hall-of-famer in my book. John Bell Plantation Robert Andrew Powell replies: Jack Shaber has such an eagle eye for inaccuracies that I wanted to, uh,…
Until Tuesday morning this page was occupied by an article headlined “Los Van Van Ban Lifted.” Staff writer Elise Ackerman prepared the story, which explained how it came to be that recordings by the venerable Cuban band Los Van Van were now being played on a commercial radio station –…
Lead Stories *Former Gotti crime-family hit man Sammy “The Bull” Gravano cooperated on author Peter Maas’s Gravano biography Underboss, to be published in April. Despite the fact that his testimony helped send Gotti to prison for life without parole, and 36 others to the slammer, and despite the fact that…
Thirteen years ago, when it was revealed that the Pentagon had spent $640 on a toilet seat and $435 for a hammer, the public was outraged. Congress immediately launched an investigation, hearings were held on Capitol Hill, and red-faced military leaders stood by helplessly as their careers came to an…
Witness Against the Prosecution Jim DeFede is getting to be quite the comedian. What a sense of humor! He sounds as though he expects something to come of [Dade State Attorney] Katherine Fernandez Rundle’s political inquisition (“A Primer on Prosecuting Corruption,” March 20). Ha! She caught Ronnie Book not with…
On January 23, New Times published a cover story entitled “You Call This a Fairway?” revealing that, for nearly two years, Dade County Manager Armando Vidal had accepted dozens of free rounds of golf from the company hired to manage the county-owned Golf Club of Miami. The story also established…
