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SoFlo: POST-MORTEM RENT DUE -

A quintessential Broward County Florida story...

A guy dies suddenly and afterwards the landlord claims that the dead guy "abandoned" his lease by dying. The landlord is now demanding three months rent which he claims is due him until January when a new tenant moves into the apartment.

But here's the best part of the story: "An interpretation of the lease will be made in January by a Broward County judge."

Broward County Florida is like another country in which it is entirely possible this dead man's relative could end up getting thrown into prison and maybe not get out anytime soon, even if he has a lawyer.

:: Local 10 News ::

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AROUND FLORIDA updates - (3#) -

# Goose Creek Incident Update: Motion to suppress evidence contends that search "was not based on reasonable suspicion of unlawful acts but upon nothing more than his own biased, unlawful racial profiling." [spt]

# Boca Mall Murder Update: Goggles may be a signature,
according to the FBI special agent studying the case. [pbp]

# Former State Rep Bob Allen is included in a Rolling Stone magazine article which recaps scandals of 2007. The piece appears in the magazine's "Yearbook 2007" special double issue.

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SoFlo: LOCAL BLOGMATICS - (4#) -
..... JAABlog and SotP .....

# Lawyer Sean Conway and JAABlog
get an article in the Daily Business Review:

*critical comments he posted
on a Web log about a controversial Broward judge*

Some of the guys at JAABlog are ribbing Conway about the spurt of attention he's been getting. One anon commenter says:

"I just saw Conway's picture
plastered on the side of a city bus.
Is his TV show already on the air?"

* * * * * * * * * *

# The saga of SotP (the acronym for Stuck on the Palmetto blog) continues with at least 140 comments at Critical Miami blog, which Carlos Miller reprises at his blog.

Commenter Nonee Moose muses:

"This saga has officially spawned both fan-fiction,
and now updates. Where’s the merchandising?"

At least two things are happening with this phenom, I think: first, the grief process continues over the loss of the blog and, second, the ripple effect that ensues from the shock which is like a pebble being thrown into a pond. The pebble has sunk and the SotP blog has disappeared, but now the ripples remain. Eventually, they will subside, I expect.

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:
BLACK & WHITE
& READ ALL OVER (4#) -

The South Florida Newspapers -

"The Sam Zell era is about to begin at Tribune Co."

The Tribune Co owns the Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, among others.

To some, the glass is half empty; to others, half full. I see no reason for pessimism and would like to give Mr Zell a chance.

Meanwhile, this is an example of a recently initiated project by the company. It has a younger, fresher look and a graphic design which is more web-friendly. It links to the Sentinel at the bottom of the "page."

The SF Sun-Sentinel, in contrast, currently has a clunky, overloaded, and turgidly moving website.

* * * * * * * * * *
"The McClatchy Co. reported Thursday
that its total revenues and advertising
revenue in November both fell 9.2%..."

McClatchy owns the Miami Herald.

Miami just may be in the process of becoming the first American city in which the Spanish-language news media achieves hegemony.

Today's Herald was completely locked out of the Internet without registration, which many people these days are loathe to do.

In making this change, McClatchy may be sending a signal of its abdication to the Spanish-language Press which will be the dominant source to which people will gravitate from the vacuum left by the Net-absconded Herald.

Let's hope McClatchy reconsiders this catastrophic change.

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SIDE-SWIPED ON THE PALMETTO (2#) -

Kudos to The Miami Herald for recognizing that Online Media has assumed an important place in many readers' lives which often supplements or compliments readership of Mainstream Paper Media.

Under the Technology section or category, the Herald ran an article today describing the end of the popular Stuck on the Palmetto blog and some reactions to the plug being pulled.

Online fight ends blog -
A popular South Florida blog shut down this week
after its author's anonymity was compromised.

I believe that many former readers of the blog are experiencing a sense of loss and are going to have to go through the various phases of adjustment to the aftermath.

The South Florida blogging scene is a lively, sometimes almost fractious, mix; the Miami Bloggers are probably the noisiest bunch in it. And South Florida Blogs have even picked up their own gadfly along the way.

The Herald article reprises well the surface facts, but doesn't explore any of the implications of what has happened here.

Although I don't blame Bob Norman personally, it is worth pointing out the underlying dynamics involved: Norman is blogging on the platform of a million-dollar Media Organization, while "Rick" was blogging as an individual; and, thus, there is a notable imbalance in power inherent in any friction between them.

Meanwhile, the comment thread at Critical Miami has grown to almost 100 comments and, with the publication of today's Herald article by Evan S Benn, is still growing.

-- Prev: DEATH OF A BLOG Entry at 12/16 below.

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CARTOON DEATH CHICKEN -

A sing-along DVD aimed at young children which appears to encourage body-bombing has been circulating around Yorkshire, England, and is being investigated by anti-terrorism detectives there.

Photo captures of the material are included in the article.

+ And I have to wonder how many of
these DVD's might be floating around the U.S.

:: This is London ::

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AROUND FLORIDA (4#) -

# "JUDICIAL HELLHOLE" - A legal group engaged in attempts to reform the civil law system has described South Florida as an "area of the country where the scales of justice are radically out of balance."

# THE POSH CAR JEWEL THIEVES - "They travel together in fancy rental cars: Mercedes, BMWs, Infinitis and Chryslers. But they hide their license plate numbers under duct tape."

A string of burglaries hits the St Pete/Tampa
area, believed to be of Caribbean origin.

# VERY GONE - Hollywood: A friend found Oliver Windell Bar, 69, on Saturday inside Bar's home but in a state of advanced decomposition.

The Medical Examiner's Office confirms that according to its tests, Bar had been dead for at least five days, but the cause of death has not been disclosed. His death has been characterized as a homicide.

# Winter Springs: Man arrested on charges involving
an escort service allegedly advertising in Orlando Weekly.

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SoFlo: UNEXPECTED GUESTS -

Welcome to Critical Miami Blog readers!

And thank you to the gracious
Alesh Houdek over there for the surge.

Please take your time to browse around here; maybe
you'll find some interesting entries or links here to read.

We are mourning the loss of a major Hub Blog together which was ostensibly based in Pembroke Pines. Alesh has a comment thread on which you can leave your thoughts or reactions.

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ACCUSED TERRORIST ESCAPES (3#) -

# Rashid Rauf , the alleged mastermind of a plot to blow up 10 transatlantic airplanes, has mysteriously houdini'd from police custody in Pakistan. There is a major manhunt on for him.

# "In my opinion it is not escape, but a case
of mysterious disappearance," his lawyer said.

# The 25-year-old was brought before a judge at a court in Islamabad for an extradition hearing when he slipped away Saturday afternoon.

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SoFlo: DEATH OF A BLOG -

We have been undergoing a Blog Crisis
of sorts here in SoFlo this past week.

First, there was the issue of lawyer Sean Conway who may have made arguably indiscreet remarks on JAABlog. I blogged about this matter below.

And then, there was an issue which I have not blogged about heretofore: Rick from Stuck on the Palmetto Blog was experiencing some sort of identity crisis because, he perceived, that another blogger (Bob Norman from the Lacy Media Empire) had threatened to "out" him or disclose his real life identity.

This latter issue has just been resolved with the stunning news this evening that the Blog is gone now - Rick has apparently wiped it all off the Blogspot servers.

It has evaporated into thin air!

I wish Rick well, although I find myself quite baffled now as to what his original agenda was and how it could have gotten pulled so far off its tracks.

This is a sad way to end the week.

Maybe this is the moment to cue up a chorus of You'll Never Walk Alone. Or, if Rick had a theme song... what do you suppose it would be? Well, you can hum a chorus of it to yourself now quietly... because that Blog is now
an Ex-Parrot.

Sorry to be the bearer of such bad news.

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FL TEACHER: MURDER/SUICIDE -

A 36-year-old teacher who grew up in Hallandale snapped on Friday, killing his recently-divorced ex-wife, their 2 young children, and his wife's girlfriend in the
Clearwater area.

Oliver Thomas Bernsdorff then killed himself. [spt]

:: Portrait of a troubled man.

:: His web page ::

:: His CV ::

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SoFlo: SHOPPING MALL MURDER -

What's the worst possible scenario that could
happen to Holiday Shopping besides bad weather?

Boca Raton: "Police have enlisted the help of the FBI's storied Behavioral Science Unit in the search for a killer who bound a woman and her 8-year-old daughter and shot them to death outside the Town Center mall on Wednesday."

+ So far, I don't find the tentative
theory of the crime very persuasive.

:: PB Post ::

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SoFlo: HIGH FEMALE DEATH TOLL -

Broward County: "Twenty-eight women and girls have been killed so far this year, an 87 percent increase over 2006 and a total surpassed only twice in the past decade."

+ Since the beginning of the year at least 3 women have been brutally murdered within a short walking distance of where I currently live. They had nothing in common except that they were female. None of them were killed by ex-boyfriends or husbands.

:: SF Sun-Sentinel ::

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