An alleged drug “queenpin” accuses Miami prosecutors of misconduct before her trial

Sandra Avila Beltrán, once known as the “Queen of the Pacific” in the Latin American drug trade, is accusing Miami prosecutors of lying about her role in cocaine shipments to the United States to persuade Mexican authorities to extradite her last year.

For Avila, a dark-haired beauty who stood out in a narco-trafficking world dominated by macho men, the misconduct accusation is a final bid to save her neck as she faces trial — or a possible plea deal — later this month.

Her defense lawyers are seeking to have a 2004 indictment dismissed, but it’s a likely long shot. If convicted of two conspiracy charges alleging drug importation and distribution, the 52-year-old Avila could spend the rest of her life in prison.

Her attorneys claim in a court filing that a federal prosecutor and drug agent were aware that signed declarations by codefendants — including Avila’s ex-boyfriend — were “riddled with falsehoods and misstatements.” Yet Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Morales submitted the evidence to Mexican authorities in 2010 to persuade them to extradite Avila, according to the defense lawyers, Stephen Ralls and Howard Schumacher.

Morales’ successor in the case, prosecutor Cynthia Wood, said in court papers the allegations against him were “false” and “without foundation.”

Avila’s reputation as the Queen of the Pacific was gained by her dominant role in the powerful Sinaloa cartel, her romantic relationship with a Colombian drug-trafficker and her influence over ocean supply routes.

Mexicans, along with the news media, have long been fascinated with Avila, who was arrested in her country in 2007. They constantly followed details of her taste for high fashion, gourmet food and beauty secrets. One rumor that made the rounds: A doctor visited her while she was jailed in Mexico to administer her Botox injections.

Last summer, a Mexican court and foreign secretary granted her extradition on the U.S. narco-trafficking indictment, which has alleged links to a cocaine deal in Chicago and a cocaine seizure in Manzanillo more than a decade ago.

Avila’s attorneys claim that Morales, the prosecutor, pressured her ex-boyfriend, Juan Diego Espinosa Ramirez, who was convicted in the same case, to sign a March 2010 declaration implicating her in the Chicago deal — without his defense attorney present. They said his declaration was instrumental in her extradition to the United States.

But according to Espinosa, “his declaration was not freely and voluntarily provided and he was denied the advice of counsel prior to signing the document,” Avila’s attorneys said in court papers.

Espinosa said in the declaration that Avila participated in a 100-kilo cocaine shipment with a trafficker named Juan Carlos Lopez Correa in 2001. And that after the cocaine was delivered to Chicago, Lopez Correa became responsible for the debt on the drug deal, he said.

On Sept. 14, 2001, federal agents intercepted a telephone call in which Espinosa, Avila and Lopez Correa allegedly discussed his outstanding payment. During the call, Espinosa asked Lopez Correa to pay for the shipment.

The current prosecutor in the case, Wood, pointed out that Espinosa’s declaration was similar to the factual statement he and his defense attorney signed in June 2009, when he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine.

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Fabiola Santiago: In Spain, the truth starts to come out about Paya “accident”

At long last, Angel Carromero has broken his silence from the confines of his negotiated parole status in Spain.

He was the woozy-eyed Spanish political activist seen from Havana on a prosecutorial videotape issuing an unconvincing mea culpa that he was driving too fast, that he was at fault for the deaths of two prominent Cuban dissidents in a car crash last summer.

Carromero’s “trial” for the deaths of Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero was Cuban political theater at its best, a closed-door concoction to cover up wrongdoing — state-sponsored murder? — a tactic Cubans in exile know too well.

With Carromero now back in his homeland, the light of truth — tenuous but illuminating — has begun to shine on the deaths of human rights champion Payá and Cepero, the young activist who accompanied the respected leader on a trip across the island to spread the message of peaceful, democratic change.

The car crash in which Payá and Cepero lost their lives on July 22 was no accident, Carromero told Payá’s family in Spain this week. Another vehicle rammed the car Carromero was driving and forced it off the road, he said.

While Payá and Cepero, the ones seriously hurt, were left in the car, men in a third car took away Carromero and Swedish politician Jens Aron Modig, another human rights activist accompanying them.

“We don’t know what happened to my father and [Cepero] … but hours later they were both dead,” Payá’s daughter, Rosa María, told El Nuevo Herald after her conversation with Carromero.

The Cuban government contends that Payá died instantly and that Cepero died a few hours later in a Bayamo hospital. But they have refused to allow anyone to see the autopsy reports.

Modig, at first detained along with Carromero, was allowed to return to Stockholm after Carromero issued his mea culpa. He has remained silent as the Spanish government negotiated Carromero’s return to Spain to serve out his Cuban sentence.

In Cuban custody, the only way to survive is to outsmart the jailers. Carromero and Modig did what they had to to secure their way out of Cuba.

But it’s time now to speak up and tell the truth — and for the governments of the European Union, Latin America and the United States to push for an international investigation of the car crash and its aftermath.

In a parliamentary hearing Thursday, Spanish government leaders admitted under pressure that they’re in a tenuous situation with Cuba because four Spanish citizens remain in Cuban prisons and they’re negotiating those releases as well. It sounded almost like an admission of blackmail.

Payá and Cepero deserve justice.

Both men had been accosted by pro-government mobs, were constantly followed by state security, and had been repeatedly threatened. In fact, Payá didn’t make trips outside of Havana because of the danger, but in the Europeans’ company he felt a measure of safety.

A state-sponsored murder is a serious charge, but this is nothing new for a government with a record of dealing violently with the peaceful opposition.

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Second eastbound lane opens on Bear Cut Bridge leading to Key Biscayne

A second east-bound lane on the Bear Cut Bridge that connects Virginia Key to Key Biscayne has been opened, giving travelers heading to the village a second lane nearly two months after structural flaws nearly shut down the bridge.

Public works administrators said they reconfigured the roadway to make more room for the second lane. On Wednesday, the first day it was in use, they said vehicular and bike traffic flowed smoothly to and from Key Biscayne, on what used to be the eastbound-only lanes headed to Key Biscayne.

Two ad-hoc westbound lanes remain in place, next to a dedicated bicycle/pedestrian lane, along the north side of the bridge.

The bridge’s westbound lanes on the structure’s south side have been completely shut down since the Florida Department of Transportation raised concerns with the county about the condition of exposed steel beams and girders in early January. The westbound half of the bridge was built in 1944; its eastern counterpart is much younger, built in 1983 in concrete-encased beams.

Though alternate planning has been underway for well over a month, county and Key Biscayne leaders are still concerned about the March 18 opening of the two-week Sony Open tennis tournament at the Crandon Park Tennis Center on Key Biscayne.

A month ago, hoping to speed up repairs, county commissioners waived the usual competitive bidding process, giving firms two weeks instead of the usual six to bid on the repair work. The repair job is still expected to take almost a year, and cost close to $31 million.

To finance the plan the county will issue bonds which will be paid off with toll receipts. Commissioners voted last month to raise the toll for cars to $1.75 from $1.50.

A casualty of the Bear Cut repair plan will be the Crandon Park Marina boat launch, which will shut down for two weeks from March 18-31, as the bridge undergoes repairs. Alternate county launch sites are no where near Key Biscayne.

The locations are: Herbert Hoover Marina at Homestead Bayfront Park, 9698 SW 328th St., Black Point Marina, 24775 SW 87th Ave., Matheson Hammock Marina, 9610 Old Cutler Rd., Pelican Harbor Marina, 1275 NE 79th St., and Bill Bird Marina at Haulover Park, 10800 Collins Ave.

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Cab drivers stage protest at Fort Lauderdale airport over safety cameras

A morning protest at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport by taxi drivers upset with technology installed into their cabs that monitors problem driving ended with two drivers being arrested, and several passengers looking for other modes of transportation.

“We have to stand up for our rights,” said Davincy Metayer, 50, who has been driving a cab for 15 years and works for Yellow Cab. “We can’t make a living like this.”

As news of the protest traveled, taxi drivers across Broward County gathered at the airport about 8 a.m., but refused to pick up fares from the dispatcher.

Although the protest was peaceful, police arrived after 10 a.m. when two taxi drivers blocked the entrance to the lot on Perimeter Road, said Broward Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Keyla Concepcion. Tow trucks were called to move the vehicles, and when the trucks arrived, the drivers laid in front of the trucks blocking them from removing their cars.

“There is no problem with peaceful protests, but blocking the way of traffic for the cab drivers who don’t want to participate created a problem,” she said.

Those drivers were arrested, but their names and the charges they face are unknown.

John Camillo, president and CEO of B&L Service Inc., which operates Yellow Cab of Broward County, said the protests originated from two drivers who became unhappy after the company installed DriveCam technology in all 547 of its cars.

The DriveCam cameras are equipped with a GPS device, video recorder and cell modem that transmit information to DriveCam.com. They were installed in the Yellow Cab cars at the beginning of February after a test group used them in December.

They detect deceleration and braking, excessive acceleration, going around corners at high speeds, going quickly over speed bumps and other problematic “events.” Video of these events is transmitted to professionals at DriveCam, who analyze it and identify risky driving.

One of the upset drivers was involved in a rear-end accident and two more events that indicated he was not paying attention, Camillo said. Despite going through Yellow Cab’s free internal coaching sessions, he was not showing signs of improvement. That’s when Camillo suggested he attend a National Safety Council class, which costs $100, as an alternative to giving up his job at Yellow Cab.

But the driver became incensed, Camillo said.

The other unhappy driver also has a spotty driving history, including a time when he covered up his in-car camera and “threw his keys on the table,” Camillo said.

Camillo said the technology and services for DriveCam will cost his company almost half a million dollars each year. But it’s all in the name of public safety.

“I’m guilty of wanting them to be safe drivers, to go home to their families and not be hurt, and not having them hurt other people,” Camillo said. “I’m guilty of all those things.”

But drivers have a different account.

“We can’t even use our brakes,” said Wilson Charles, 38, who recently completed the 8-hour National Safety Council class.

Ithamar Matador, who took part in Wednesday’s protest, said he one of two cab drivers who were brought into the Yellow Cab office Tuesday after his red light activated. He said he was taking a fare from the airport when he slammed on his breaks after a car cut in front of him, avoiding an accident.

He was given two options; “They told me I can either pay $100 for the course or hand over my keys.”

“I handed over my keys,” said Matador, 38, who has been driving a cab since 2003, adding that with that kind of light system he, and other drivers, would be called in every week. “I can’t afford that.”

Some cab drivers pay as much as $585 a week to drive their cab, they said. They also have to pay $3.50 per fare from the airport, which is up from $2 last year, they said. They also have to pay $1 for every time someone pays with a credit card.

Most drivers say they work seven days a week and about 15 to 18 hours a day. After all the fees, they say there is little left for them to take care of their families.

Greg Meyer, the spokesman for the airport, said Wednesday’s protest did not have a huge impact on travelers.

Instead of the cabs being dispatched from the holding lot, they were sent directly to the airport Meyer said. He said normal service returned at about 1 p.m.

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Temporary ban on Fla. welfare drug testing upheld

TALLAHASSEE --
A federal appeals court upheld the temporary ban on Florida’s drug-testing for welfare recipients Tuesday, saying that a lawsuit challenging the program had a good chance of succeeding.

The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta sided with a lower court decision, stating that Florida failed to show that the drug testing plan was so critical that the Fourth Amendment, which bars unreasonable searches by the government, should be suspended.

The decision — which did not weigh in on the case’s ultimate constitutionality question — is the latest setback in Gov. Rick Scott’s controversial drug testing push. In 2011,Scott and the Florida Legislature instituted a program for drug-testing all recipients of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. Luis Lebron, a single-father and TANF applicant who refused to take the test on constitutional grounds, filed a lawsuit with help from the American Civil Liberties Union.

In authoring the court’s opinion, Judge Rosemary Barkett said that Florida had not proven that its drug-testing program serves a “special” or “immediate” need, or that it even protected children in families with substance abuse.

“There is nothing so special or immediate about the government’s interest in ensuring that TANF recipients are drug free so as to warrant suspension of the Fourth Amendment,” Barkett wrote. “The only known and shared characteristic of the individuals who would be subjected to Florida’s mandatory drug testing program is that they are financially needy families with children.”

Scott immediately vowed to appeal the decision and take his fight to the Supreme Court.

“The court’s ruling today is disturbing," he said in a statement. "Welfare is 100 percent about helping children. Welfare is taxpayer money to help people looking for jobs who have children. Drug use by anyone with children looking for a job is totally destructive. This is fundamentally about protecting the well-being of Florida families.”

The appeals court relied on a similar case in Georgia, which struck down a program requiring political candidates to take drug tests. That case found that Georgia did not show that there was a drug problem among elected officials, and the law was mostly “symbolic.”

In rejecting Florida’s appeal to the lower court’s preliminary injunction, a trio of federal judges took a similar position.

“The state has presented no evidence that simply because an applicant for TANF benefits is having financial problems, he is also drug addicted or prone to fraudulent and neglectful behavior,” Barkett wrote on behalf of the court.

The ACLU’s associate legal director Maria Kayanan said the ruling was a vindication for struggling families who apply for government assistance.

"The state of Florida can’t treat an entire segment of our community like suspected criminals simply because they are poor and are trying to get temporary assistance from the government to support their families,” said Kayanan, who was lead counsel on the case.

Florida also passed a law last year requiring drug testing for all state workers, but that issue is also tangled in constitutional challenges and litigation. A district court found the state worker testing plan unconstitutional, and Scott appealed. The appeals court is scheduled to hear arguments on that case next month.

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A year in, a space for sharks and stars is taking form at Miami’s new Museum of Science

Standing in the busy construction site that will become the $275 million Patricia and Phillip Frost Museum of Science by 2015, it’s hard to imagine that sharks will one day swim in a space now filled with cranes, rebar and dust.

Slightly easier to visualize is the 70-foot-tall planetarium dome, just starting to emerge as a circle of steel jutting diagonally from the ground.

“It takes a lot of time on the foundation,” said Gillian Thomas, the museum’s president and CEO. “But then it pops out of the ground and goes fast.”

A year after breaking ground at 1075 Biscayne Blvd., the underground parking garage is finished and the main entrance is rising. In addition to the planetarium and Gulf Stream-inspired aquarium, the 250,000-square-foot complex will include a rooftop garden, outdoor energy playground, exhibition space and an eyeful of Biscayne Bay.

“We’ve oriented the whole thing for the views,” said Thomas during a tour of the site earlier this month. “You’re never far away from content, but you’re never far way from a great view and fresh air.”

Science museums of the past were erected as seemingly impenetrable temples of knowledge with imposing columns and great staircases, Thomas said. The new five-story building, designed by the firm of British architect Sir Nicholas Grimshaw adjacent to the construction site of a the county’s new art museum, is going for an open, inviting feel.

“We asked the architect to make a friendly building where you can see what’s going on inside,” said Thomas, wearing a silver construction helmet bearing the words “The Future Begins Here.”

The next chapter of the museum’s future begins in 2015, though exactly when is still unknown. Thomas said she wants to make it through one more (hopefully uneventful) hurricane season before locking in a date.

So far, the museum has raised $70 million in addition to $165 million from Miami-Dade County bonds, bringing it close to the immediate goal of $275 million needed for the project’s completion. The museum would like to raise an addition $25 million for transitional costs.

One of its fundraising events, the annual Galaxy Gala — with individual tickets priced at $500 — and $100-a-person Big Bang after-party, will be held March 9 at the JW Marriott Marquis.

Thomas said the museum’s progress has added momentum to the efforts.

“As we get more visits going, that will help us to finalize a number of supporters that we have out there,” she said. “It’s definitely making it easier to attract attention.”

The neighboring Miami Art Museum, to be called the Pérez Art Museum Miami when it opens in December, has noticed the same thing.

With construction about 80 percent finished, the art museum has raised $175.5 million of its $220 million goal, including $100 million from county bonds.

Earlier this month, Miami art collectors Debra and Dennis Scholl announced the donation of about 300 artworks to the museum. That gift followed the December announcement of a $5 million commitment from Miguel “Mike” Fernandez, chairman of private equity firm MBF Healthcare Partners.

“I think things have been significantly different in the last six months even,” said Leann Standish, the art museum’s deputy director for external affairs. At least once a month, the staff gives a tour to potential contributors to the museum’s capital campaign. “Certainly the donor conversations are much more exciting.”

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Why Mr Smith ... er ... Mr. Sternad didn’t go to Washington

L amar Will Take Us Far.

The catchy slogan of the congressional candidate who called himself Lamar Sternad was the earliest indication of a campaign of deception. His first name isn’t Lamar.

But Justin Lamar Sternad’s slogan was spot-on in one regard.

Of the hundreds of no-name political neophytes who mount quixotic bids for office in Miami, Sternad went further than them all: The 10th floor of a federal justice building.

There in open court Friday, Sternad was formally accused of violating three federal laws stemming from his suspicious campaign finances, which were uncovered in an investigation by The Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald.

Sternad earned the distinction of running a truly far-out campaign, one of the most-cynical, scandalous and strange South Florida has ever seen.

His campaign involved false federal campaign finance reports, at least $81,486 in secret checks and cash (much of it in $100 bills stuffed in envelopes), a bad boy of Miami politics, and a femme fatale of a campaign consultant, Ana Alliegro.

Alliegro’s whereabouts are unclear to the public. She skipped out on talking with the FBI in September.

Her close friend, former U.S. Rep. David Rivera, is the feds’ ultimate target.

The Miami Republican, who denies wrongdoing, is suspected by investigators and accused by campaign vendors of helping secretly back Sternad to undermine a rival, Joe Garcia, in the Democratic primary for the 26th Congressional District, 26, which stretches from West Miami-Dade to Key West.

Garcia’s now a congressman.

Sternad’s now a defendant. He’s cooperating with the feds.

Alliegro and Rivera aren’t named in Sternad’s federal charging document, which lists nameless “co-conspirators.”

But without Alliegro, it could be a challenge to prosecute Rivera.

Coincidentally, Sternad launched his masquerade of a campaign on the holiday that celebrates disguises: Halloween. In a letter dated Oct. 31, 2011, he notified the state of his intention to run.

Was he a plant, a ringer for Rivera, from the get-go? Or was he like so many other folks with no political experience who decide to run for office in the hope of making a Mr.-Smith-Goes-to-Washington difference?

“I’m running for Congress because right now there’s a high discontent with the recycling of establishment politicians,” Sternad said in a May interview with CBS4’s Elliot Rodriguez.

Days later, he started receiving the unreported cash that would be his downfall, federal records show.

During the CBS4 interview, the Democratic Sternad pointedly avoided criticizing the Republican congressman, saying it would be “pretty pretentious or arrogant of me to start going after David Rivera’s jugular like one of the other candidates, Joe Garcia’s doing. He’s mud-slinging.”

Sternad went on to call Garcia a “three-time loser.”

On Friday, it was clear Sternad lost big.

Wearing a gray polo shirt, Sternad was the only of the defendants not dressed in a tan jail jumper. He never said a word.

It’s unclear when Sternad first wound up on a crash-course with the justice system — that is, when he first came into contact with Alliegro, his de facto campaign manager.

Under one version of events (and there are a few) she happened to wander into the Wyndham Garden South Beach hotel where she (unintentionally?) ran into Sternad, who worked at the hotel. They got to talking.

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A crazy, hazy tomato battle at Tobacco Road

Here at Miami’s birthplace for blues and booze, there was a battle.

A melee of Corona-soaked revelry to rid a farm of its winter excess of tomatoes.

The crowd of university students, kickball leagues and business consultants stood around some 20,000 pounds of the vegetable-fruit behind the bar Tobacco Road on Saturday.

The concept, simple: launch as many tomatoes as your arms can wield. Wash it off at the nearby shower. Wash it down with more beer.

As South Florida shtick goes, this was the gold standard.

“You guys put your hands in position,” James Goll, who markets the festival, said through a megaphone. “Let’s fire it up.”

The throng responded with the jest of 20-year-olds, cheering, camera phones raised skyward. Two girls crouched beneath a table that doubled as a barricade.

“Get back,” Goll said. “Get back.”

As the fire truck unleashed its siren, he gave them the cue to go.

They launched toward the red dunes. The stench of fermenting tomatoes wafted in the air.

Among them was couple Chris Gunn and Ginny Cannon, both lasted a few minutes until they ambled back out.

“Mayhem,” Gunn said of the first few minutes.

He kissed Cannon on the face and they both walked back into the multitude.

The red haze was at least 20-feet deep. They threw tomatoes until it turned into slush and it stuck like paste on bodies and faces.

TV crews had their fill of the camera-ready goodness.

A man who only identified himself as Jack, survived all of 30 seconds until the fun turned against him.

“I got nailed with a tomato,” he said. holding an ice pack on his swollen eye.

Injuries do occur, Goll said. Since the festival began last year, there has not been anything serious.

“A lot of people just want to take out some aggression,” he said.

The free-for-all endured about 45 minutes until a fire truck washed away the mashed up mess.

They hosed down the asphalt until it formed a river of red out into the parking lot and onto SW 7th Street.

A day’s worth of fun gone down the drain.

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Parents of missing Hallandale Beach baby formally charged

The parents of an infant who disappeared more than a year and a half ago were formally charged Friday in Broward County Circuit Court.

Brittney Sierra, 21, faces two counts of felony child neglect.

Calvin Melvin, 27, was charged with three felony counts of providing false information to police.

Each could face more charges if a Texas lab confirms that DNA from a tiny skeleton unearthed behind the couple’s former Hallandale Beach rental house in January matches their baby, Dontrell Melvin.

Dontrell, who would have turned 2 this month, had not been seen for nearly 18 months before police learned of his disappearance Jan 9.

At first, Melvin told Hallandale Beach Police that the child was with his family in Pompano Beach. But when police went there, they were told by the grandparents they didn’t have the child and hadn’t seen him.

During questioning by police, Melvin changed his story several times, investigators said. At one point, he told them he’d taken the baby to a fire station under Florida’s Safe Haven Law.

But police didn’t believe him and began questioning Sierra, as well. The couple, who have another child together, pointed their fingers at one another, police said.

Their answers led police to the backyard of their former rental home at 106 NW First Ave. It was there, tiny human remains were found in the ground.

Hallandale Beach Maj. Thomas Honan said until they have a solid DNA match — or a confession — there is nothing else police can do.

“The father is pointing fingers at the mother and the mother is pointing fingers at the father,” Honan said Friday. “All we have is the skeleton.”

Friday’s arraignment was standard — within 45 days from their arrest — Honan said.

Melvin remains in the Broward County Main Jail on a $151,000 bond, according to jail records. His charges stem from the times he changed his story while being interviewed by police. His court appointed attorney, Edward Hoeg, said Friday that he has filed a motion to reduce the bond. Melvin has entered a not guilty plea, his attorney said.

“We are going to fight these charges adamantly,” he said.

Sierra is being held at the North Broward Jail on $100,000 bond. Her charges were related to the two times Sierra had the opportunity to mention the missing baby to the Department of Children and Families, but failed to do so, Honan said.

DCF made contact with both Sierra and her mother, Renee Menendez, who was raising her four other children ranging in age from 8 to 11, more than 30 times, according to documents released in January.

It wasn’t until a hotline call Jan. 9 that police discovered the boy missing.

Sierras two other children — one of whom is an infant — were taken into state custody, as were Menendez’ four children.

There will be a dependency hearing related to Sierra’s children at 10 a.m. Monday at the Broward County Courthouse.

She has entered a written not guilty plea, according to her court appointed attorney, Dohn Williams Jr.

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‘Dangerous dog’ ordinance passed in Pembroke Pines

An ordinance in Pembroke Pines aimed at constraining the behavior of dogs who brutally assault other dogs and humans passed unanimously late Wednesday, in response to two dog attacks that occurred in the city last December.

The nuanced regulations would require a dog owner to pay a fine and up to $750 in “dangerous dog” registration fees if a dog was determined to be “dangerous” by an independent veterinarian. The new ordinance also requires the dog to wear a muzzle and restricts running at large in public spaces.

Owners of a “dangerous dog’’ are also required to submit a copy of an insurance policy in the amount of no less than $300,000.

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Miami imam testifies that he lied when he professed support for the Taliban

In testimony that was at turns deadly serious and comical, a Miami imam accused of aiding terrorists testified Wednesday that he lied about his ostensible support for the Pakistani Taliban because he wanted to obtain $1 million from a purported Taliban sympathizer — who was actually an FBI informant.

Hafiz Khan, 77, the one-time leader of a Miami mosque, said he repeatedly deceived the informant, known as Mahmood Siddiqui, because Siddiqui had promised him the money to help poor victims of war between the Taliban and Pakistan army in the Swat Valley near the Afghanistan border.

Khan, accused of sending money to the U.S.-designated terrorist organization, was unaware that his conversations — in which he wished Americans would die in pursuit of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden — were recorded by the FBI.

“What I said was all lies,” Khan testified in Pashto through an interpreter. “It was just because of the money.”

Khan, on trial in federal court since early January, spent a second day on the witness stand in his own defense on charges of supplying at least $50,000 from 2008-2010 to the Taliban, sworn enemies of the U.S. and Pakistan governments. Khan, charged with four counts of providing material support to a terrorist organization, has maintained that the money he sent from Miami to Pakistan was for his family members, the poor and a religious school, or madrassa, in the Swat Valley — not to arm the Taliban.

“They are totally our enemies,” Khan testified about the Taliban, despite his ardent statements of support in the FBI-recorded phone conversations.

Khan, a naturalized U.S. citizen who came to this country in 1994, sparred during cross-examination with Assistant U.S. Attorney John Shipley, who grew frustrated as the frail yet feisty imam dodged his questions about his true beliefs about terrorism.

At one point, Khan said: “I kindly suggest to you that you go to a hospital. You have a mental problem.” He added that the cross-examination was a waste of time.

“I’ll let the jury make that determination, Mr. Khan,” the prosecutor said.

The 12 jurors tried to stifle their laughter, at which point U.S. District Judge Robert Scola excused them to take a break.

Scola then advised the defendant to bring his testimony down a notch. “You are never going to convince Mr. Shipley to change his mind about you,” the judge told him. “The only chance you have is to convince the jury to believe you.”

Shipley peppered the defendant with questions about his recorded conversations with the FBI informant, in which he praised the attempted 2010 bombing in New York’s Times Square.

“There are many times I am agreeing with him, but that does not mean that I mean it,” Khan testified.

Shipley, however, pointed out that Khan made similar comments in other telephone conversations with friends and relatives that also were intercepted by the FBI. The prosecutor repeatedly tried to compel the defendant to admit that he believes it is justifiable to kill Pakistani police and government officials because they have supposedly committed killings and atrocities themselves.

“What you are suggesting is exactly what the Taliban and al-Qaida have suggested for years. And we heard it in this courtroom,” Shipley said.

Khan admitted he made those statements in the recorded conversations, including saying to the FBI informant: “May God give the government to the Taliban.” Khan said he was expressing moral outrage over the Pakistan Army’s killing of women and children in the Swat Valley during its war with the Taliban.

At the same time, he seemed to suggest he endorsed an eye-for-an-eye philosophy.

“I did say this, yes. Now I will explain,” he told Shipley. “They killed people by cannon. They were innocent people killed in their homes. ... The entire public said they committed atrocities.”

Khan frequently attacked Shipley’s questions, calling them repetitive and refusing to answer them. The witness also gave rambling speeches that evaded the prosecutor’s questions, especially toward the end of the day when he spoke nonstop for almost 15 minutes.

Khan’s sons, Irfan and Izhar, were also charged along with him and others in the terrorism indictment returned in 2011. But prosecutors dropped the charges against Irfan without explanation last year, and the judge dismissed the indictment against Izhar, a Broward imam, for lack of evidence during the trial.

Hafiz Khan is likely the final defense witness in the trial, which could wrap up this week. His defense team had planned to call other witnesses to testify via video link from Pakistan, but last week the Internet connection was cut off during testimony of the second witness, a suspected Taliban fighter.

Why the link went dead at an Islamabad hotel where the testimony was being taken remains a mystery.

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Shooting incident underway in west Miami-Dade; public warned to stay out of area

Miami-Dade police are working an incident in west Miami-Dade of a report of shots being fired by a suspect, who may have set his home on fire.

Details were sketchy at 8 p.m., but police said there is a person shooting in the area along Southwest 154th Avenue and 57th Street, near Miller Road.

There were also reports of a hopuse fire at 15415 SW 57th St.

There are no reports of anyone injured at this time.

Police are advising the public to stay away.

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Pension reform plan put on hold

TALLAHASSEE --
House Speaker Will Weatherford’s push to close the state’s $136 billion pension system to new state employees is on hold.

A report released Friday was supposed to provide an estimate of how much the change would cost to pay out benefits to the employees currently in the system while switching new state employees into 401(k)-style retirement plans.

Instead, the report was deemed incomplete. Weatherford said Monday he wants the missing information before he can decide his next move, and that won’t be until at least March 1.

Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel, has made ending pensions for new employees one his top priorities of the coming legislative session. He says change is needed because the state’s current pension — which has about 145,000 current and future beneficiaries — is unsustainable and will require a mammoth taxpayer bailout sometime in the future.

Unions oppose the move because they say it shifts costs and risks to workers.

A report released Friday by Milliman, a Virginia actuarial firm, concluded that closing the state’s pension system to future employees would endanger the benefits of those currently enrolled in the pension plan. The problem: Because Weatherford’s proposal would turn away new workers, the pension plan would be forced to rely on a shrinking payroll base on which contributions to retirees are made.

To make up the shortfall, either workers or taxpayers would chip in more, the report stated.

Weatherford said he wasn’t surprised that the $70,000 report, which he had ordered, concluded it would cost more money to reform Florida’s retirement system.

“We know that doesn’t come free,” Weatherford said.

But what the report didn’t include were costs associated with keeping the pension plan intact, making it difficult to compare costs between reform and status quo.

Weatherford said he didn’t know why that estimate wasn’t included.

“We do need, I believe, to have that baseline so that we can give the citizens of Florida and the Legislature all the information necessary to make a decision,” Weatherford said.

Ben Wolf, a spokesman for Florida’s Department of Management Services, said as soon as the report was received, state officials notified Milliman that the study was incomplete. He said another study, this one costing $25,000, will be sent to the state explaining how much the current pension system will cost.

So far, at least, Senate President Don Gaetz hasn’t publicly matched Weatherford’s enthusiasm in reforming the retirement system for state workers, teachers and college and local government employees.

The Senate is preoccupied instead with reforming smaller pension systems that are run separately by local governments. Sen. Jeremy Ring, D-Margate, who chairs the Senate committee that is handling pension reform, said he doesn’t see a pressing need to reform the state pension plan.

“With municipal pensions, there’s a legitimate need for reform,” Ring said. “But the Florida Retirement System is a completely different discussion because it’s difficult to define the urgency. I don’t believe moving to a 401(k) system is a bad thing. The challenge, however, and it’s a big however, is that it could be a bad thing in terms of how much it could cost to close down.”

Ring said he’s received little guidance from Gaetz on the issue.

“And that’s because he wants to wait for all actuarial reports to come out,” Ring said. “Ultimately, he’ll have to get engaged and give us some direction.”

But with the confusion over the Milliman report, that would have to wait.

Gaetz’s spokeswoman, Katie Betta, said in an e-mail he was reviewing the study and couldn’t comment.

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Marc Caputo: A swig of water isn’t going to sideline Marco Rubio

It’s official: Marco Rubio is a national punch line.

After the Florida senator’s weird decision to interrupt his Tuesday rebuttal of the president’s State of the Union speech by taking a swig from a bottle of water, he was quickly mocked on The Daily Show, Colbert Report, Tonight Show with Jay Leno and the Late Show with David Letterman.

Four days later, Saturday Night Live worked him over.

But none of it means Rubio’s a joke.

His recovery from the gaffe has been serious business, a clear-eyed example of protecting a political brand as Rubio eyes a White House bid in four years.

Rubio quickly joined the chorus of mockers Tuesday night by poking fun at himself on Twitter. He posted a picture of the Poland Spring water bottle he grabbed. He then fund-raised off it.

The coverage and mockery perversely benefitted Rubio in another respect: It drew attention away from a speech that, in the eyes of liberals, deserved to be torn apart for misrepresenting the president’s record as well as Rubio’s.

“Don’t worry, Sen. Rubio, nobody noticed — that you gave a speech,” comedian Stephen Colbert joked Wednesday after devoting more than 40 percent of his almost half-hour show to Rubio’s water break.

By then, Rubio had already spent the day making fun of himself on TV.

Less than eight hours after his speech, Rubio appeared on ABC’s Good Morning America, where George Stephanopolous asked him what happened.

Rubio smiled, reached for a water bottle and took a swig. Stephanopolous laughed.

“You’ve shown an ability to laugh at yourself,” Stephanopolous said.

Said Rubio: “I needed water — what am I going to do? . . . God has a funny way of reminding us we’re human.”

Rubio gave a similar performance on Fox & Friends.

Then on Wednesday night, his political action committee Reclaim America PAC started selling $25 water bottles emblazoned with RUBIO in big red letters on a white background.

“Quench your thirst for conservative leadership? Order a bottle now,” Rubio advertised from his Twitter account.

This isn’t just political showmanship or boldness. It’s a type of alchemy, figuratively turning H₂O into campaign gold.

All of that money flows back into a sophisticated brand-building operation boosting Rubio, as The Miami Herald’s partner paper, The Tampa Bay Times, details on the front page of today’s Herald.

Of the $1.7 million Rubio’s committee spent through Dec. 31, the lion’s share has been used to pay political consultants and underwrite travel for the senator throughout the nation, where many Republicans view him as the great Hispanic hope for their party as he helps lead a bipartisan push to reform immigration laws.

Rubio’s roots as the son of working-class immigrants and his ability to describe it all in vivid detail made him the obvious choice to deliver the Tuesday rebuttal to President Barack Obama’s speech.

Where Obama said “middle class” eight times in about an hour, Rubio said it 16 times in less than 15 minutes.

“Mr. President, I still live in the same working-class neighborhood I grew up in,” Rubio said Tuesday.

“My neighbors aren’t millionaires. They’re retirees who depend on Social Security and Medicare,” he continued. “They’re workers who have to get up early tomorrow morning and go to work to pay the bills. They’re immigrants who came here because they were stuck in poverty in countries where the government dominated the economy.”

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Parents decry closing of two Broward schools for special-needs kids

If you ask parents why they value Broward’s Wingate Oaks Educational Center — and why they’re so furious about its imminent closure — the answer often boils down to trust.

The school for medically fragile children is a place where students might need help going to the restroom, and parents trust the teachers and staff to respect their child’s dignity. David Martinez’s 7-year-old daughter, Anabelle, must eat lunch through a feeding tube, and it took time for Martinez to let Wingate Oaks’ nursing staff handle that delicate procedure.

“It’s not right, it’s not right,” Martinez says about the school’s closing. “On the backs of our children, they want to save money.”

Broward’s school district has defended its plan to close Wingate Oaks, along with another special-needs school, Sunset Learning Center. Both Fort Lauderdale schools are set to shut down at the end of the school year. The district calls it a move toward operational efficiency, as both centers are at well under 50 percent capacity — combined, they serve fewer than 200 students. The district says that students who are relocated to the county’s remaining four centers that focus on kids with special needs will benefit from expanded programming. Any savings realized from the closures will be reinvested in the classroom, Superintendent Robert Runcie said.

“I recognize that people don’t like change, but they also need to have an open mind about this,” Runcie said. “This is going to provide better outcomes for their students.”

Parents at the schools remain angry — one group in a growing chorus of special-needs families who are upset with the school district.

In recent weeks, a whole other group of infuriated parents (unaffected by the two school closures) have trekked down to Broward School Board meetings to criticize the system as flawed. They accuse district staff of having a combative attitude with parents, forcing parents to go to court for reasonable requests, and pushing disabled students off the academic path to a traditional diploma.

Parents’ verbal exchanges with School Board members have at times turned nasty — one parent recently turned her back on board members while she spoke to them to symbolize how the district had “turned its back” on her daughter.

Unhappy parents have formed a special-needs task force to plot strategy. There’s been talk of filing a class-action lawsuit.

“People react when they’re not heard,” said Broward parent Rhonda Ward, who is part of that task force.

Ideally, decisions regarding special-needs children — how difficult their courses should be and what support services and therapies they should receive — are made by a cooperative team that includes parents, teachers, school psychologists and other district staff. In many cases, everyone successfully works together to create an individualized education plan for a disabled child. A well-thought-out plan will allow the child to reach his or her full academic potential, while avoiding unrealistic expectations that doom the student to repeated failures and disappointment.

The problem is, parents and school staff may not agree on what goals are realistic, and those differences of opinion can easily end up in court. For example, a parent who is unhappy with the district’s evaluation of her child can request the hiring of an outside independent evaluator — at taxpayers’ expense. The district then has two options: Pay the outside expert, or take the matter to a state administrative judge in a “due process” hearing, and argue that an outside second opinion isn’t needed.

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Van Myers, former president of Wometco, dies at 95

Sylvan “Van” Myers spent 44 years at Wometco, rising through the ranks, first to head the data division, later as executive vice president of bottling, vending and food service operations and finally as president and CEO of the company.

After retiring in 1984, Myers devoted himself to the South Florida community and working to improve people’s lives, said son Bruce Myers.

“I think he was a role model, a leader,” Bruce Myers said. “He would’ve made a good politician, but people like that don’t want to run for office.”

An avid sports fan, devoted father and husband of 72 years to wife Jane, Myers died Tuesday. He was 95.

Born in Norfolk, Va., in 1917, Myers’ father wanted him to join him in the family’s mattress company. But Myers had bigger plans and left home for Harvard University.

It was there that an acquaintance gave Myers the phone number for a young woman, a senior in high school. Jane and Van began dating, eventually marrying in 1940.

But the honeymoon was short — Myers soon went into the Navy and served as a lieutenant during World War II. He was assigned to an amphibious craft in Okinawa.

After the war, he returned briefly to Boston, but was soon contacted by Mitchell Wolfson, the co-founder of Wometco Enterprises, a prominent Miami-based entertainment company that founded WTVJ, Miami’s first television station.

Myers followed Wolfson down to Miami in 1946 and never left.

At Wometco, he was a born leader. He rarely raised his voice, said his son, but he had a quality that made people follow him.

“He’s just the type of person you would want to be around and work for,” Bruce Myers said.

When Wolfson died in 1983, Myers became president and CEO, responsible for overseeing its sale to Kohlberg Kravis Roberts.

Although his presidency was brief, he made sure to stick around long enough to advocate for his former employees, his son said.

By the time Kohlberg Kravis Roberts took over the company in 1984, Wometco’s assets included 45 movie theaters, three TV stations, 47 cable TV systems, the Miami Seaquarium, the Citrus Tower and one of the largest Coca-Cola bottlers in the nation

Ever concerned with giving back to the city and the people he loved, Myers remained on several community boards in his retirement, including WPBT-Channel 2 and The Family Counseling Service. He was a founding member of Feeding South Florida and an original board member of the Mitchell Wolfson Foundation, of which he was a member when he died.

“He was literally the soul of decency, in my estimation,” said Dave Lawrence, a former publisher of The Miami Herald and founder of The Children’s Trust. His warm sense of humor and his thoughtfulness made him a good leader and a great friend, Lawrence said.

Myers was a tireless sports fan, often taking his two children to see the Miami Dolphins, the Miami Heat and the University of Miami Hurricanes. Another weekly family activity, during his time at Wometco, was Friday screenings of movies the company wanted to show at its theaters.

Well into his 90s, Myers still insisted on going somewhere outside his home every day. He had an endless reading list, as a longtime member of the Book of the Month Club, and he was interested in every subject.

In addition to his wife Jane and son Bruce, Myers is survived by daughter Catherine Myers and sister Valerie Rothschild.

There will be a celebration of his life at 1 p.m. Feb. 23 at the Coral Gables Country Club, 997 N. Greenway Dr.

In lieu of flowers, Myers’ family requests that donations be made to WPBT-Channel 2 or Feeding South Florida.

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Dolphins take stadium pitch to Miami Gardens

The Miami Dolphins took their Sun Life Stadium renovations pitch on the road Thursday, highlighting support from a county commissioner and the mayor of Miami Gardens, the team’s hometown for 26 years.

The politicians’ backing carries weight in the city that perhaps knows the Dolphins best.

But that neighborly history also has made some people in Miami Gardens skeptical about the team’s promises of economic benefits from the planned $400 million in renovations, about of half of which would be funded by taxes.

Miami-Dade Commissioner Barbara Jordan, Miami Gardens Mayor Oliver Gilbert and Dolphins CEO Mike Dee stressed that upgrading the stadium to attract more international soccer games and concerts during the football offseason would employ more locals, bring customers to the city’s shops and restaurants, and spur development on vacant parcels nearby.

“When people come to a Super Bowl or a national championship in Miami Gardens, they eat on Brickell, and they sleep on South Beach. And they shop in our stores. They support our businesses,” Gilbert said. “That’s what this is about.”

He called the Dolphins “our largest taxpayer and a vital community partner.” The team sponsors some of the city’s biggest events, including the annual Jazz in the Gardens festival.

But that has not done much to assuage the concerns of others in the city, who say Miami Gardens has received little payoff from being home to the stadium.

“I’m a Dolphins fan, but I have to say, very honestly, there has not been an incredible windfall to this community,” said former City Councilman André Williams.

Williams said the city should draw up a marketing plan to lure sports fans and event-goers to nearby businesses, to ensure that any deal to receive county taxes makes sense.

The Dolphins’ proposed financing plan relies on a new annual $3 million state subsidy and a hike of county mainland hotel taxes to 7 percent from 6 percent.

The state money could go instead to public services, Jordan acknowledged Thursday.

“Those dollars do go to schools, and to roads and highways,” she said. But other teams receive state subsidies from sales-tax revenue they help generate, and the Dolphins deserve more of that money, she added.

“It’s bringing our money back to our community — I don’t see a problem with that,” she said.

On Monday, Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, whom commissioners tasked with negotiating with the team, announced that the Dolphins had reversed their position and agreed to put a potential deal for tax dollars to a public vote — before May 22, when NFL owners will award the 2016 and ’17 Super Bowls.

As part of its campaign to drum up support, the team held Thursday’s news conference at the Betty T. Ferguson Recreational Complex in Miami Gardens, down the street from the stadium.

Dolphins players and coaches sometimes volunteer at the complex, Jordan said. But there was irony to the location: Ferguson, a former county commissioner, burst onto the political scene leading the opposition to the stadium.

Ten-year-old Miami Gardens, the county’s third-largest city, didn’t exist at the time. Instead, Ferguson rallied residents from the Crestview and Rolling Oaks communities. A homeowners association filed a racial discrimination lawsuit against the county, arguing building the facility would break up middle-class black neighborhoods.

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Was that Che in Beach hotel? Not any longer

Gus Exposito, 51, of Davie, couldn’t believe what he saw in the marble walls of South Beach’s W Hotel: a larger-than-life framed photograph of what looked like communist revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara.

“He was a mass murderer, killed thousands of Cubans execution-style,” Exposito wrote in an email, comparing the long-dead Fidel Castro pal to Adolf Hitler or the Ku Klux Klan. “I spoke to the manager and he referred to it as art!”

A hotel employee said complaints started almost as soon as the photo, about seven feet tall, went up last week. It came down Tuesday.

“We did it as a matter of respect and sensitivity toward the local community,” hotel manager Damien O’Connor said. “We are sorry for any inconvenience we may have caused.”

The man in the photo looks a little different from the iconic image of Che Guevara taken by Alberto Díaz “Korda” Gutiérrez in 1959. Is this a younger Che or someone dressed like Che? Or perhaps a post-modern self-portrait of artist Gavin Turk?

In The Guardian, a London newspaper, Turk said he made a photo of himself posed as Che to advertise an exhibition: “It was quite a degraded, grainy image, so I could photograph myself in such a way that you wouldn’t recognize that it was me and not, in fact, Che. You only need key elements of the photo — the beret, the long hair, the position of the eyes (as with classical icons, looking up and to the right), a bit of beard — to make it function as a symbol.”

But it sure looks like Che.

The image is common enough, and enough time has passed since the 1959 revolution, that not every Cuban-American is outraged. Asked about the idea of hanging a Che poster in a South Florida hotel, a regular Miami Herald reader named Mario Iglesias said it’s time to grow up.

“I think the Cuban-American community has to mature and learn that the right to put up a picture of Che is the very reason we find Castro and Che so repugnant — because they would act to quash opposing speech,” he wrote in an email. “It is the very result of being in favor of a free society that there will be holocaust survivors who have to tolerate Nazi marches and Cuban-Americans have to recognize that not protesting a Che poster is not the same as supporting Castro.”

For Exposito, though, the right to post a Che picture doesn’t translate into a good reason to display it. It seemed to ruin his night out.

“We went to dinner with my wife and two couples at Mr. Chow and after dinner we took a walk to the rear to smoke a cigar, and — bang — there it was. We could not believe our eyes!” he wrote.

El Nuevo Herald Staff Writer Juan Carlos Chavez contributed to this report.

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State to crackdown on tutoring contractors

Florida will crack down on tutoring contractors that defraud school districts and — for the first time — require criminal background checks for people who head tutoring firms under changes announced Tuesday by the state’s top education official.

Education Commissioner Tony Bennett issued a statement outlining a series of steps his department will take to rein in fraud and ensure that tens of millions of dollars in education funding steered to private tutoring firms is better spent.

“We must hold the businesses and their leaders responsible for proving that the dollars directed to tutoring ... produce the results intended,” Bennett said. “Our students deserve nothing less.”

The statement comes in response to a three-month investigation by the Tampa Bay Times, which found that lax state oversight has made subsidized tutoring a source of easy cash for criminals, cheaters and opportunists.

Besides screening owners of companies that offer the mandated instruction, the state also will work with lawmakers to cut the high costs of the program — the Times found that the average company charges more than $60 an hour per student — and create better ways to measure whether tutors are helping kids learn.

“We should know that our investment in our students is producing a return,” Bennett said.

The commissioner also said the education department will go after fraud and seek to recoup “misused state resources.”

The statement offered few details about how the Department of Education will accomplish these goals, and more specifics weren’t immediately available Tuesday afternoon.

The department office in charge of overseeing the tutoring program, known as supplemental educational services, has been affected in recent years by reorganizations and turnover.

Some companies have capitalized on weak oversight, the Times reported Sunday.

The newspaper found that a convicted rapist, a woman who served probation for child neglect and a fugitive were among the listed officers and directors of state-approved tutoring companies for poor kids in failing schools.

In at least 40 cases in the past few years, companies have faked enrollment forms or billed for tutoring that didn’t happen. And the program is rife with conflicts of interest, the Times found.

Federal education law originally required school districts to hire private tutoring companies for poor students in schools that failed to improve test scores, but Florida got a waiver from that law last February.

A month later, state lawmakers acted to require tutoring as part of a state law, quietly voting to keep the money for tutoring companies flowing. This school year, Florida set aside at least $50 million for private tutors. The money comes from federal Title I funds that districts otherwise would be free to spend in high-poverty schools.

The state requirement was included at the urging of tutoring industry lobbyists and Bennett’s predecessor, Gerard Robinson, who declined to discuss his support for the program.

H. Marlene O’Toole, chairwoman of the state House education committee, said she was ready to work with the education department to tighten oversight.

“It’s very discouraging when we have good programs to help young people, and we find someone, usually an adult, who will take advantage of this,” said O’Toole, R-Lady Lake.

District administrators across the state, including Hillsborough County schools Superintendent MaryEllen Elia, have decried the program, saying public schools could better spend the tax dollars by hiring more teachers or creating their own programs.

“I am encouraged by the Commissioner’s bold and immediate response to a very serious issue,” Elia said in a statement Tuesday. “Everyone who receives public dollars needs to be held accountable. The state needs to put safeguards in place and put the focus back on meeting the needs of children.”

Pinellas County schools Superintendent Mike Grego put it bluntly Monday in an interview with the Times editorial board.

“Right now we’re forced to do it,” Grego said of hiring private tutoring firms. “I want out.”

Tampa Bay Times staff writer Cara Fitzpatrick contributed to this report.

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Papal transition won’t lead to big changes in South Florida parishes, archbishop says

Like millions of other Roman Catholics, when Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski woke up Monday morning and heard the news that Pope Benedict XVI had announced his resignation, he thought it was just rumor.

When he realized it wasn’t, Wenski called Mary Ross Agosta, the Archdiocese’s communications director, and told her: “ ‘Get ready for a busy day.’ ’’

And so it was, as he gave interview after interview on how the pope’s resignation — the first in nearly six centuries — might affect the Church and its believers.

Wenski doesn’t anticipate “radical shifts’’ in the church with a new leader at the helm.

“Whoever comes on as pope will be Catholic, so...he’ll present the Catholic teachings and there’s not going to be any changes in those teachings, because the pope is not an absolute ruler who can make it up as he goes along,’’ Wenski said.

Still, he said, “most people live their faith on a local level,’’ so that a papal transition isn’t likely to shake things up in South Florida parishes.

Wenski, 62, said he understood how demanding the pontifical duties are.

“When the pope says he doesn’t have the strength anymore, considering my own schedule in this little archdiocese, I get it. It’s a grueling job...He embraced the suffering that comes with the job but he doesn’t have the physical health and energy to continue it.

“His doctors have been telling him to restrict his travel, and the ability to travel has become a requisite for a modern-day pope.’’

Anne Llewellyn of Plantation, a parishioner at St. Gregory the Great, applauded the pope for understanding his limitations and for making “the difficult decision for the good of the church.’’

She called Benedict “a brilliant man’’ who deserves thanks for his leadership. However, she remains “angry with the U.S. Church’’ over sex scandal cover-ups, and no longer supports the archdiocese.

Barry University theology professor Edward Sunshine acknowledged the pope’s resignation comes at a time when the church sex-abuse scandals ”have weakened the moral authority and credibility of church leaders,’’ and when 10 percent of U.S. adults identify as former Catholics.

By bowing out, Sunshine added, the pope “is setting a modern precedent that is necessary for the church to function well in the world today.”

With people living longer — Pope Benedict XVI is 85, his predecessor Pope John Paul II was 84 when he died after 27 years as head of the church — there is an increased chance of someone suffering from a debilitating condition, such as infirmity or senility, Sunshine said.

“An orderly transition of church leadership if necessary is much better than a long, agonizing wait for an infirm pontiff to die in office,” Sunshine said. “Pope Benedict has set an example for world leaders and everyone else that there comes a time when it is better to let go of power.’’

When it comes to Benedict’s successor, Karen McCarthy, of Hollywood, is hoping for someone more moderate. She’s angry about certain church positions, and no longer attends Church of the Little Flower

“The Vatican has treated women horribly, like we are less than men,’’ she said. “What they have done to the nuns is repulsive...I hope we get a more moderate pope and one in tune with the times.’’

Archbishop Wenski said he doubted Pope Benedict XVI would interfere with his successor once he leaves the post Feb. 28.

“There’s still going to be only one pope, and I don’t think there’s any danger of any polarities of power, one against another.’’

This article includes comments from the Public Insight Network, an online community of people who have agreed to share their opinions with The Miami Herald. Sign up by going to MiamiHerald.com/Insight.

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