Chinese New Year rings in at St. Thomas University

A Chinese Lunar New Year celebration was held at St. Thomas University on Sunday, Feb. 10, in Miami Gardens. The free event was open to the public and also featured an ancestral-veneration ceremony, lion dances and a reception.

Read More..

Faith Hill Becomes a Brace Face

Faith Hill has been rocking a new accessory that garnered lots of attention when she hit the Grammy Awards red carpet on Sunday. The country crooner stepped out wearing clear braces, which led us to ask: What was wrong with her teeth in the first place?

Never mentioning that she's been wearing veneers for decades, Hill, 45, explained the mouth metal to radio station KNIX at the Country Music Awards, saying, "I had braces as a kid. I forgot to wear my retainer."

She added jokingly, "Kids, wear your retainer!"

RELATED PICS: What supermodel also had dental work?

Hill and her husband Tim McGraw, 45, were both presenters at the 55th Annual Grammy Awards on Sunday night. Hill paired her brace face with a stunning black J. Mendel gown.

What do you think of Hill's braces? Does she need them?

Read More..

Career thief accused of burglarizing Anne Frank Center claims he wanted to look at exhibits

Burglar? Try Holocaust aficionado.

A career thief charged with burglarizing the Anne Frank Center last winter is insisting to a Manhattan jury that he had just gone inside because he wanted to look at the exhibits.

Michael James, 53 -- who has 30 theft and drug sale arrests on his rap -- is accused of swiping the executive director's wallet after sneaking into her office, located behind a full-scale display of Frank's bedroom in the Park Place center. He is linked to the burglary by fingerprint and video evidence.

"I knew he didn't want to learn more about Anne Frank, because I saw he was running away!" victim Yvonne Simons told The Post after testifying yesterday.

Umar Abbasi

Michael James.

"Here I am, the head of a tolerance organization, and it's awkward -- because this cannot be tolerated," the Dutch-born Simons said.

James, who has done three prison stints for burglary, robbery and possessing stolen goods, is charged with burglary for going through the unlocked front doors and into Simons' office fifteen minutes before the center opened -- and grand larceny for allegedly using her credit cards.

Additional reporting by Jamie Schram

Read More..

U.S. Century to OK details of new deal

U.S. Century Bank is expected to sign off on Monday on its letter of intent — the framework for a plan to recapitalize the bank.

Under the deal, a local group of investors, led by Jimmy Tate of Tate Capital and Sergio Rok of Rok Enterprises, will bring in fresh capital and wipe out the Doral bank’s bad loans, while allowing it to operate independently.

The investor group is expected to inject $50 million in capital into the bank, becoming majority owners. In addition, the group will pay about $90 million to buy certain loans, including all $98 million of U.S. Century’s non-performing loans, said U.S. Century President and Chief Executive Carlos J. Dávila. The deal would also provide for a negotiated amount to be paid to the federal government to repay U.S. Century’s $50.2 million in TARP funds.

A definitive agreement, based on the letter of intent, is expected next month. Pending shareholder and regulatory approval, the deal could be completed by mid-year, Dávila said.

Read More..

Carnival ship fire quickly extinguished as ship wallows in Gulf awaiting tug

The Carnival Triumph, a Galveston, Texas-based passenger cruise ship with the theme “Great Cities Around the World,” might have been better off sitting at port, as a court initially ordered.

As of Monday morning the 14-year old ship was going nowhere, operating on emergency generator power after a fire Sunday in one of the diesel generators killed its propulsion. The fire was quickly put out by an automatic fire extinguishing system, and none of the 4,229 passengers or crew are said to be in any danger

All were waiting patiently as a giant tug boat trudged toward the Triumph, now operating under generator power, with the intention of hauling the 100,000 ton, 893-foot vessel to the nearest port in Progreso, Mexico. It is expected in port some time Wednesday afternoon. Carnival Cruise Lines headquarters are in Miami-Dade.

“The cause of the fire is still to be determined,” said Carnival spokesman Vance Guliksen. In a brief news release, Guliksen said “there were no casualties to guests or crew.”

He said all passengers will be flown back to the United States and will be fully refunded.. Carnival said it will cover any additional transportation expenses. Passengers will also receive a free future cruise.

As of 11 a.m. Tuesday another Carnival ship, the Carnival Elation, was on the scene transferring food and beverages.

According to Carnival, some basic auxiliary power has been restored, cabin toilets are working on part of the ship and some elevators are operational. The dining areas are serving hot coffee and limited hot food.

The $420 million Triumph made news early last year after the family of a German tourist killed in the Costa Concordia disaster in the Mediterranean filed a $10 million lawsuit against Carnival. A judge found the family had standing, and ordered the ship held at port in Galveston. The court later allowed the ship to move between ports until a hearing takes place.

The lawsuit contends that Carnival Cruise Lines is the corporate parent of the Costa Concordia.

Read More..

The Most Romantic Gift Lamar Odom Has Given Khloe Kardashian

Who knew NBA star Lamar Odom was such a romantic?

With Valentine's Day coming up, Khloe Kardashian revealed to ET the most romantic gift her husband Lamar Odom has ever given her at their fragrance launch for Unbreakable Love, at the Sears in Downey, CA.

Pics: Making Scents -- A Guide to Celebrity Fragrances

"I will say the year that we launched Unbreakable Bond [the couple's first fragrance] and we were in Orlando, and Lamar was in another city playing a game and he was meeting me there, so I flew to the hotel before him. And when I got there -- we got married on the date of the 27th -- he had gotten 27 dozen roses set up in the whole hotel room. And he wasn't even in that city yet!," Khloe gushed.

But despite the romantic gesture, she shared why she's not that into celebrating Valentine's Day.

"I'm not a big -- like, I love Valentine's Day -- but I don't think someone should get you a gift just because it's Valentine's Day," she said. "I'm more about spending time -- I feel like you should do nice things because you want to -- not because you're forced."

Khloe: Kim K Just Wants to Move On

But one gift she undoubtedly thinks would be great for Valentine's Day?

The couple's third fragrance Unbreakable Love, which she said even Lamar's teammates are big fans of.

"His whole team actually asks for it," she revealed. "We gave them all for Christmas Unbreakable Joy. They all asked for it. And for Valentine's Day, I'm going to be giving them all Unbreakable Love. I'm putting them in their locker room."

Click the video to hear Khloe talk about Lamar's cologne obsession, her sister Kim's divorce drama, and why she's calling her mom Kris Jenner a "gold digger!"

Read More..

Doctor slapped with 55-count indictment for allegedly selling pain killers to drug dealers

A doctor was slapped with a 55-count indictment today on charges he allegedly sold prescriptions of oxycodone and other highly addictive pain killers to drug dealers from his Manhattan and Rockland County offices, state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman announced.

The indictment also charges Dr. David Brizer with illegally possessing controlled substances and underreporting his income by at least $500,000 on his state personal income tax returns for 2011 and 2010.

According to the indictment, Brizer, 60, charged his customers up to $300 each time he sold them illegally sold prescriptions for several millions of dollars worth of pills out of his offices at 48 Burd Street in Nyack and 244 W. 54th St. in Manhattan.

Dr. David Brizer.

“Instead of saving lives, Dr. Brizer used his position to supply drug dealers and feeds a prescription drug epidemic that is devastating families across our state,” Schneiderman said.

“The message is clear – whether you are a doctor or a criminal on the street, my office will prosecute those profiting off the cycle of abuse.”

Brizer is charged with two counts of criminal tax fraud, 34 counts of criminal sale of a prescription of a controlled substance, 15 counts of criminal possession of a controlled substance, two counts of offering a false instrument for filing, as well as a scheme to defraud and conspiracy charges. All are felony counts and he faces up to seven years in prison.

Brizer allegedly issued fraudulent prescriptions for fake patient, or those in the names of people who had no knowledge he was doing so.

Read More..

Green cards for sale at a South Beach hotel: Competition is on for EB5 investment visas

If David Hart gets his way, South Beach’s 42-room Astor Hotel will be on a hiring spree this year as it adds concierge service, a roof-top pool, an all-night diner, spa and private-car service available 24 hours a day.

New hires will be crucial to Hart’s business plan, since foreign investors have agreed to pay about $50,000 for each job created by the Art Deco boutique.

The Miami immigration lawyer specializes in arranging visas for wealthy foreign citizens under a special program that trades green cards for investment dollars. Businesses get the money and must use it to boost payroll. The minimum investment is $500,000 to add at least 10 jobs to the economy. That puts the pressure on Hart and his partners at the Astor to beef up payroll dramatically, with plans to take a hotel with roughly 20 employees to one with as many as 100 workers.

“My primary responsibility is to make something happen here over the next two years that will create the jobs we need,’’ Hart said a few steps away from a nearly empty restaurant on a recent weekday morning. “It’s all going to be transformed.”

Though established in the 1990s, the “EB5” visas soared in popularity during the recession as developers sought foreign cash to replace dried-up credit markets in the United States.

Chinese investors dominate the transactions, accounting for about 65 percent of the nearly 9,000 EB5 visas granted since 2006. South Korea finishes a distant second at 12 percent and the United Kingdom holds the third-place slot at 3 percent. If Latin America and the Caribbean were one country, they would rank No. 4 on the list, with 231 EB5 visas granted, or about 3 percent of the total.

Competition has gotten stiffer for the deep-pocketed foreign investors willing to pay for green cards. The University of Miami’s bio-science research park near the Jackson hospital system raised $20 million from 40 foreign investors under the EB5 program, most of them from Asia. The money went into the park’s first building; visa brokers are waiting to see if the second building will proceed so they can offer a new pool of potential green-card sales.

In Hollywood, the stalled $131 million Margaritaville resort had hoped to raise about $75 million from EB5 investors before ditching that plan last year to pursue more traditional financing. A retail complex by developer Jeff Berkowitz in Coral Gables also launched a program to raise $50 million in EB5 money for the project, Gables Station. Hart worked with other EB5 investors to back pizza restaurants in Miami and South Beach. A limestone mine in Martin County also was backed by EB5 dollars.

This year, the city of Miami itself is expected to get into the business by setting up an EB5 program to raise foreign cash for a range of city businesses and developments. The first would be the tallest building in the city — developer Tibor Hollo’s planned 85-story apartment tower, the Panorama, in downtown Miami.

With a construction cost of about $700 million, Miami’s debut EB5 venture hopes to raise about $100 million from foreign investors, said Laura Reiff, the Greenberg Traurig lawyer in Virginia working with Miami on the EB5 effort. “This is a marquis project,’’ she said.

The arrangement is a novel one for Miami, with the city planning to help a private developer raise funds overseas for a new high-rise. And it would allow Hollo and future participants to tout the city of Miami’s endorsement when competing with other Miami-area projects for EB5 dollars. “We will have the benefit of the brand of the city of Miami,’’ said Mikki Canton, the $6,000-a-month city consultant heading Miami’s EB5 effort. “A lot of these others are privately owned and they won’t have that brand.”

Read More..

Two Fantasy 5 tickets sold in Broward take $92,069 jackpot

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) – Three tickets, two purchased in Broward County, matched all five Fantasy 5 numbers to collect a jackpot worth $92,069.38 each, the Florida Lottery said Sunday.

The winning tickets were bought in Plantation and Tamarac and in Homosassa, lottery officials said.

The numbers drawn Saturday night were 1-3-16-18-25

The 463 tickets matching four numbers won $96 each.

There was no Florida Lotto winner. The jackpot is now $16 million for Wednesday’s drawing.

Read More..

Chris Brown Car Collision

ET has learned that Chris Brown was involved in a solo, non-injury traffic collision in Beverly Hills at noon today, blaming the paparazzi for losing control of his Porsche and colliding with a wall.

Pics: Remembering Whitney Houston

A statement from Lieutenant Lincoln Hoshino of the Beverly Hills police details the incident: "On February 9, 2013 at approximately 12:03 p.m., entertainer Chris Brown was involved in a solo, non-injury traffic collision in the 600 Block Bedford Drive/Camden Drive alley. Mr. Brown was the driver of the vehicle and collided with a wall. Brown stated that he was being chased by paparazzi causing him to lose control of his vehicle. Brown's Black Porsche was towed from the scene at his request."

Related: Rihanna Accompanies Chris Brown to Court

Earlier this week, Brown visited an L.A. courthouse with girlfriend Rihanna on to oppose a motion to revoke his probation stemming from his 2009 assault on Rihanna. Prosecutors claim Brown did not show sufficient evidence that he completed his required community labor sentence. 

Read More..