State investigates foster father in Jackson South case

State child welfare administrators are investigating a Miami foster parent who may be implicated in an alleged scheme to abduct a newborn child from the nursery at Jackson South Community Hospital.

The foster father, who has not been identified, brought his family to the Jackson nursery and visited with a baby that had been taken into state care by the Department of Children & Families, said Esther Jacobo, DCF’s top Miami administrator, on Wednesday.

An unidentified Jackson employee had told the foster father the baby was available for adoption, and the foster father could pick up the child.

The incident, which occurred in October, ended up with Jackson announcing on Tuesday the termination of two Jackson South managers, the chief nursing officer and maternity ward director. Jackson spokesman Edwin O’Dell said they were offered the opportunity to resign and they did so. Jackson did not identify the employees.

DCF sheltered the baby after the agency received a call to the state’s child abuse hotline and investigated the child’s welfare, Jacobo said. The agency placed a hold on the baby, meaning the child could not be released back to his or her birth mother. DCF was called back to the hospital within a day or two amid rumors that “people were selling a baby.”

An investigation showed that a high-level Jackson employee was friendly with the foster father, who was seeking to foster or adopt another child. He allowed the foster father, Jacobo said, to bring his family to visit with the newborn.

On the day the newborn was to be discharged, the foster father appeared and tried to take the baby with him, Jacobo said. A Jackson nurse stopped him before he was able to leave the hospital with the infant. The nurse said that, without a valid DCF identification badge, the father could not take custody of the baby.

A source told The Herald the father currently has only one child in his custody.

In the wake of the incident, Jacobo said, DCF agreed to perform a series of training sessions at Jackson involving dependent children.

“We are not placing any other children” in the home of the foster father, Jacobo said. “We are in the legal process of figuring out what to do with his licensure.”

Jacobo said the agency is looking at all its options, including attempting to pull the foster father’s license.

O’Dell said Jackson executives first learned about the problem about Oct. 9. They started an investigation, which led to the resignations on Oct. 15, but Jackson Chief Executive Carlos Migoya did not notify county leaders and board members until he released a memo on Tuesday — shortly before WTVJ-NBC 6 reported the problem at Jackson South.

In the memo, Migoya wrote: “While no patients were harmed as a result of this incident, we concluded that Jackson policies were indeed violated. Consistent with our culture of accountability, employees were terminated or otherwise disciplined. Appropriate reports were made to regulatory agencies.”

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Justin Bieber Rep Reacts to Murder Plot

Following news that two New Mexico men have been suspected of plotting to murder pop sensation Justin Bieber, a rep for the singer has released an official statement to ET.

RELATED: N.M. Men Plotted to Kill Justin Bieber

"We take every precaution to protect and ensure the safety of Justin and his fans," says the rep.

According to a police report obtained by ET, a New Mexico prisoner named Dana Martin, serving out two life sentences for the rape and murder of a 15-year-old girl, enlisted the help of former fellow inmate Mark Staake and his nephew Tanner Ruane to carry out four murders. Two of the reported targets were Justin Bieber and his bodyguard.

The papers then state that what ultimately foiled the plot was Martin himself inexplicably turning in his co-conspirators. Staake was reportedly arrested in Vermont on outstanding warrants, while his nephew made it to New York, where police reports allege he was arrested with "murder tools and pruning shears."

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2-year-old Bronx toddler saved by Good Samaritan after wandering into traffic

An adorable 2-year-old Bronx girl dodged death today after wandering alone out of her home and walking into a traffic-heavy street — where she was scooped up by a quick-thinking Good Samaritan.

“As a father, this is nuts!” fumed Pepsi deliveryman Martin Rodriguez, 32, who spotted Samira Dawson teetering barefoot across busy White Plains Road in Parkchester wearing just a onesie and diaper. “I have a little girl the same age and it crushed me to see this.”

At 9:10 a.m. today, Samira somehow escaped her family’s apartment on Guerlain Street undetected, walked outside and strolled across White Plains Road.

“She was at the double line in the middle of the street!” Rodriguez said.

“She dropped her little bookbag in the middle of the street, and that’s all she was worried about.”

Then, “A lady grabbed her,” Rodriguez said. The unidentified woman gave Samira to a Parkchester public safety sergeant, who called cops.

“She appeared like a bubbly child,” said Police Officer Harry Kwan, who draped his coat around Samira. “She appeared nervous but obviously enjoyed being held.”

Samira’s worried-looking brother, Davante Valentine, 20, showed up at the scene at 9:39 a.m.

“I don’t know what happened,” Valentine told The Post. “All I know is I was sleeping and my [18-year-old brother] was supposed to be watching her and he left the house without telling me.”

His and Samira’s mom Ingrid Dawson — who told cops she had gone to the pharmacy that morning — showed up just before 10 a.m. and yelled, “Oh my God!” after seeing her daughter.

“You were supposed to be watching her!” Dawson, 38, snapped at Valentine.

Both police and child-protective services workers are probing the incident. No charges had been filed as of last night.

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Lennar to borrow $1.7 billion from Chinese bank

Miami-based Lennar Corp. has gotten approval on $1.7 billion in loans from China Development Bank to fund the development and construction of two major projects in San Francisco, according to a person familiar with the transaction.

The contract, set to close by Dec. 31 subject to various conditions, would mark the first U.S. loan by the big state-owned Chinese bank. One condition — tagged the “Chinese component”— is that China Railway Construction Corp. be included as a general contracting partner in the project, the person said.

Closing by year’s end is crucial because of new tax rules set to take effect, the person added.

The agreement, first reported in The Wall Street Journal, would provide funding for the first six years of what is envisioned to be a 20-year project.

The loan agreement, reached Dec. 7 after Lennar officials met in China with bank officials, provides for $1 billion in financing to a partnership led by Lennar to redevelop Hunters Point Shipyard-Candlestick Point, a site in southeast San Francisco spanning more than 700 acres, the person said. Plans for the mixed-use community call for nearly 12,000 residential units on the site. Construction is expected to begin in the first quarter of 2013.

Under the pact, the Chinese bank would provide another $700 million to a partnership of Lennar, Stockbridge Capital Group and Wilson Meany, a real estate investment and development firm, to redevelop Treasure Island and Yerba Buena Islands in San Francisco Bay. Some 8,000 units of housing are planned for the mixed-use project on 535 acres. The U.S. Navy is set to turn over the first parcel of land to the development company in late 2013.

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Legislative leaders dish out salary increases to top staff

TALLAHASSEE --
Florida’s new legislative leaders handed out hefty raises and salaries to many of their top staff and newly hired talent even as thousands of state workers went for a sixth year without a bump in pay.

Senate President Don Gaetz and House Speaker Will Weatherford, who were sworn in last month, immediately hired new chiefs of staff and paid them more than taxpayers pay state Cabinet officials. They are paying 62 top policy advisors and staff directors more than $100,000 a year. And they gave salary increases totaling $252,000 to their 17 highest paid employees.

Giving the most in raises was Gaetz, R-Niceville, who promoted 10 people already making more than $100,000 a year in state jobs. The biggest promotion went to his top aide, Chris Clark, whose salary jumped from $77,000 as an aide in Gaetz’s legislative office to $150,000 as the Senate president’s chief of staff. Clark started in the Legislature in 1994, making $12,771 a year. Gaetz said his salary is commensurate with those who have held the job before.

Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel, gave more modest pay increases to his highest earning staff. Seven employees, who earned more than $100,00, got raises totaling $52,000.

The salaries were “based on a number of factors including increased workload, matching offers made by other organizations, merit, recommendations from supervisors and years of service,’’ said Ryan Duffy, Weatherford spokesman. (Duffy is paid $95,000, a $20,000 increase over what he was making last year as spokesman for the House Republican office.)

State workers, by contrast, have not seen a pay raise in six years. Last year, the Legislature also tapped into their take-home pay by trimming three percent to pay the annual contribution to the Florida Retirement System. The result is a 15 percent drop in earning power for most state workers, labor unions say.

Unions have challenged the pension law, which was sponsored by Gaetz and supported by Weatherford, and are awaiting a ruling by the Florida Supreme Court.

“The mantra of legislative leadership is: ‘Do as we say, not as we do,” said Rich Templin, spokesman for the AFL-CIO. “They want to slash funding for teachers and go after state worker pensions, but they also see the taxpayer as funding their own little fiefdoms.”

Not everyone received a pay raise. Some House and Senate salaries remained the same, despite years on the job or increased education and training. And salaries for many returning staff in the House and Senate Democratic offices remained unchanged.

The legislative leaders also brought in new talent and paid them top dollar.

Weatherford hired Kathy Mears, a Tallahassee political consultant, for $145,000. She had previously worked as a deputy chief of staff under former Gov. Charlie Crist and was the communications director for former House and Senate leaders.

Gaetz lured Lisa Vickers, the former head of the Department of Revenue, to be one of his senior executive assistants. She now earns $135,000, a $15,000 annual boost in pay from the $120,000 she made as an agency head.

The Senate president’s communications director, Katie Betta, was hired as Gaetz’s deputy chief of staff. He gave her a $20,000 salary increase over the $107,000 she was making doing the communications job for former House Speaker Dean Cannon. Betta’s salary is higher than the $76,000 paid to the previous Senate president’s communications director, Lyndsey Cruley.

Jim Rimes, a former director of the Republican Party of Florida, was hired to be the director of the Senate Majority Office at $120,000. He last worked as a lobbyist representing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, AT&T and Home Depot.

Together, the top members of the executive staffs of the two presiding officers earn $7.2 million a year — with $3.5 million spent by the House and $3.8 million spent by the Senate, according to a Herald/Times analysis.

The total cost to taxpayers of all legislative salaries, including district staff and the annual salary paid to each legislator is $27.8 million for 1,645 employees in the House, and $21.8 million and 1,644 employees in the Senate. Legislators earn $29,697 per year; Weatherford and Gaetz earn $41,181.

Not every union official objects to the staff pay raises. Doug Martin, spokesman for the American Federation of State and Federation, believes “the Legislature needs the best it can get because a poorly written law costs billions, not millions.”

He said Florida already has the smallest, least expensive government per capita “and one of the primary reasons for that efficiency is to have excellent long-term employees.”

But, Martin added, many of the people he represents were willing to forgo a raise to avoid layoffs during the economic crisis . “Now that the economy is improving,” he said, “they deserve a raise too.”

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Jamie Foxx Dishes on Leonardo DiCaprio

It's an ET exclusive!

On Wednesday Oscar-winner and Django Unchained star Jamie Foxx sits down with Nancy O'Dell to talk about his new film and open up about his interesting on-set relationship with co-star Leonardo DiCaprio.

Video: Oscars Flashback '05: Jamie Foxx Wins for 'Ray'

Also tomorrow, Anne Hathaway's style evolution and an update on Kate Middleton's health. Plus, we unveil a mystery Hollywood bride ready to walk down the aisle.

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Supporter of Orthodox Jewish sex abuse victim attacked in Brooklyn

A staunch supporter of an Orthodox Jewish sex abuse victim was attacked on a Brooklyn street today by the bleach-throwing son of a man he’d accused of being a pedophile.

Anti-sex abuse activist Rabbi Nuchem Rosenberg, 62, was ambushed as he walked down Roebling Street across from Schnitzler’s Famous Fish market around noon, he and witnesses told The Post.

“He comes up to me and he taps me on the shoulder,” the still-shaken Rosenberg recounted after being treated for ocular burns at Woodhull Medical Center.

“It is Mr. Schnitzler, who owns the fish store,” Rosenberg said.

Paul Martinka

Rabbi Nuchem Rosenberg attacked In Williamsburg this morning.

“He walk up hard to me. He looks me in the face. I saw him holding a glass. I thought it was coffee or something and he throws it in my face.”

Rosenberg runs an information hotline and blog for sex abuse victims and was a nearly daily presence at the trial of powerful Hasidic leader Nechemya Weberman.

The attack was in retaliation for his support of Weberman’s now 18-year-old victim, as well as for his claims that his alleged attacker’s father, Monsey rabbi Shalom Schniztler, “is a pedophile,” Rosenberg said.

On Monday — as Weberman was convicted Monday on 59 counts of abusing of a Brooklyn schoolgirl — Rosenberg posted on his blog, accusing rabbi Schnitzler of abusing young boys.

“I said Mr. Shalom Schnitzler should pack up his bags and join Mr. Weberman in jail,” Rosenberg recalled.

The activist also posted on Twitter after Weberman’s conviction.

“Burech hashem!! (Praise God!!),” he tweeted. “Chazer (Pig) Weberman Is Arrested After All 60 Charges Was Totally True! Rabunim & Chazerim (Rabbis & Pigs) Are All The Same Garbage.”

“Two days later, this is what happens,” Rosenberg said, referring to the attack.

According to Rosenberg, his attacker is a relative of Rabbi Baruch Lebovitz, whose 2010 child sex abuse conviction was reversed and is slated to be retried in February.

Police had not charged anyone late yesterday in the alleged assault.

Rosenberg — who left the medical center in a hospital gown after police took his bleach-stained clothes as evidence — was enroute to the 90th Precinct to try and identify his attacker in a lineup.

Witnesses said the bleach-tossing thug fled the street after dousing Rosenberg.

Primo Santiago, who manages a liquor store on the same block as the fish market, was just opening up shop when the attack occured.

“It happened so fast,” he said. “Out of the corner of my eye I saw [Rosenberg] walking down the street, and the other guy ran from the fish store and threw the bleach.”

“He didn’t say anything,” Santiago said of the attacker. “He just ran toward the guy.”

After the attack, Primo saw Rosenberg staggering and making a phone call, and told the wounded man to rinse out his eyes in a nearby phone store.

“He said I think I got bleach on my face, that’s all he said,” Primo recalled.

Sources said Hatzolah, the Jewish ambulance corps, refused to pick Rosenberg up, so he waited for EMS to take him to the hospital.

Rosenberg said he’d been on his way to pay bills at a corner store when he was accosted.

He said it wasn’t his first encounter with the fish store owner, who has spit at him before.

Rosenberg said his outspokeness has made him the target of threats for years.

“I am the activist in the community that opened up the can of worms,” he noted. “In our community we have so much molesting going on — from teachers, from ordained rabbis, from any kind of religious people.

“And we have ritual baths called the mikvah and there is so much molestation going on. Children who are three- and four-year-old, they go there with naked old people and I kept on saying, ‘this has to stop.’”

“So they ostracized me,” Rosenberg said. “they threw me out, and since then there is not a peaceful day in my life.”

The latest attack has him fearing for his life.

“I am very much afraid,” Rosenberg said. I’m thinking of going out of town for a week or two.”

Additional reporting by Josh Saul and Kirstan Conley

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Tips for managing workplace stress

There are end of the year deals to close, budgets to meet, gifts to buy, and just thinking about it has your stress level rising. But when does stress turn into distress and at what point should your employer intervene?

For American workers, coping with workplace stress is a year-round concern that employers are beginning to see as partly their responsibility. Three-fourths of employees believe that workers have more on-the-job stress than a generation ago and nearly half say they need help in learning how to manage it, an Attitudes in the American workplace study by the American Institute of Stress shows.

Most of us harried workers struggle with the daily pressure of time demands, but some cross over into the danger zone. The telltale sign that a breakdown is near is a complete lack of work-life balance.

“Often these are the people working 14 hours a day and expecting others to do it, too,” said Charles Nemeroff, chairman of the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. “I’ll ask them when is the last time you had fun and they look at me like are you kidding?”

Service professionals such as lawyers, financial advisors, accountants and doctors particularly are susceptible with increased client demands and technology making it more difficult to shut off job stress. Often they push themselves harder and harder to achieve.

Attorney Harley Tropin, a shareholder at Kozyak Tropin & Throckmorton, just doesn’t see that formula leading to a long career. He wants to help his lawyers strive for balance and change the way their brains and bodies react to stressors. Last month, he brought in medical experts to help them identify stressors and learn coping skills such as breathing and meditation. “It’s important to deal with stress the right way, to make a conscious effort to do something about it and not assume it will take care of itself,” Tropin says.

Tropin personally defuses the stress of arguing in court, by practicing Mindful Meditation, a widely adopted form of meditation that has become increasingly popular with business leaders. It involves focusing on your mind on the present and becoming aware of your breathing.

Alan Gold, a federal judge for the Southern District of Florida, also practices mindfulness meditation and has become a proponent of teaching practices for stress reduction to attorneys. Gold has advocated for the creation of a task force on the mindful practice of law with the Dade County Bar Association and the local Federal Bar Association.

Gold says he regularly sees attorneys shuffle into his courtroom on the brink of a breakdown. He links erosion in the degree of civility in the profession with lawyers’ inability to cope with extreme stresses.

They may lash out in anger at a co-worker, assistant, client — or even a judge.

“If you recognize you’re in this situation, the next step is to get out of it. The quickest and simplest way is to slow down and take time to focus on your breathing. This is not something that comes naturally for lawyers. It’s counterproductive to their bottom line way of doing business,” he says.

Outside of meditation, some employers are turning to on-site yoga, or just simply workload management to help employees better manage stress. At Kane & Company, a South Florida CPA firm, employees recently learned from a psychologist how to become more effective controlling their job-related stress. Suggestions included breathing exercises, exercise in general and focusing on relaxation techniques. Monte Kane, the firm’s managing director, says the workshops help his staff with everyday stress, but he makes it his responsibility to know when they have entered the burnout zone.

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SunPass investigation shows South Florida officers often go home early

South Florida police officers used to return to the station at the end of a shift to turn in their paperwork and patrol cars. But technology has revolutionized a cop's workday, and those laptops, radios and take-home cruisers make it possible to go AWOL or duck out of work early.

SunPass toll records analyzed by the Sun Sentinel found cops from Miami to Plantation cutting out before their shifts ended, sometimes signing off via the radio from locales nowhere near their jurisdiction.

"The truth is, it's easy," said Miami police Maj. Jorge Colina, who oversees internal affairs for the area's biggest municipal police force. "You're hoping you don't get dispatched to a call ... But you could get a head start and be up on the expressway out of the city when they tell you, 'OK, have a good night.'"

To read the entire two-day Sun Sentinel investigation click here.

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Behind the New Modern Seinfeld Twitter Account, Which Is Not About Nothing

Seinfeld has never left our pop culture lexicon. Just recently we’ve seen it referenced in the presidential race and in Game of Thrones parodies. But what would the seminal “show about nothing” be like if its characters could use cell phones or Facebook? The @SeinfeldToday Twitter account, which popped up Sunday evening, ventures to propose of-the-moment plots for a modern Seinfeld. For example:  

Kramer is under investigation for heavy torrenting. Jerry’s new girlfriend writes an extremely graphic blog. George discovers Banh Mi.

— Modern Seinfeld (@SeinfeldToday) December 10, 2012

The man behind the account, BuzzFeed’s sports editor Jack Moore, started tweeting out scenarios with his friend, comedian Josh Gondelman, and then decided that the joke merited its own account. Moore is a Seinfeld fanatic himself: “I’m pretty much constantly watching episodes in the background while I’m doing anything,” he told us in an email. “I have a thumb drive with the whole series on it that I keep in my bag pretty much all the time.” 

RELATED: Rich Folks, Saggy Pants, and the Vast Manatee Conspiracy

So far, the modern-day episode summaries ring true, despite warnings from Gawker last year that classic episodes wouldn’t have worked if the characters just had the use of newfangled technology. “It would be different but not as different as everyone acts like,” Moore wrote to us. “People always say that ‘if they had cell phones Seinfeld couldn’t exist,’ which is true for a certain type of Seinfeld episode, but not as a general rule (which I think the account shows).” 

RELATED: Jon Huntsman Finds His Voice by Sounding Like a Dad on Twitter

The account makes it obvious that Internet apps and 2012 trends would create the same awkward situations that Seinfeld thrived on. For example: 

Kramer uses grinder to meet new friends, doesn’t know it’s a gay hook-up app. Jerry refuses to admit he cried on @wtfpod.

— Modern Seinfeld (@SeinfeldToday) December 10, 2012

Elaine has a bad waiter at a nice restaurant, her negative Yelp review goes viral, she gets banned. Kramer accidentally joins the Tea Party.

— Modern Seinfeld (@SeinfeldToday) December 10, 2012

George thinks his GF is faking a gluten-intolerance, feeds her real cookies, sending her to the ER. Autocorrect ruins Jerry’s relationship.

— Modern Seinfeld (@SeinfeldToday) December 10, 2012

We kind of really want to see some of these made, actually. Reunion special? 

Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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