The wealthy financier was connected to well-known names including Trump, Clinton and Prince Andrew before his July arrest
Wealthy financier Jeffrey Epstein, whose apparent suicide in jail has stunned the US, courted many rich, powerful and famous people over his lifetime as a mover and shaker on the party circuits of New York and Florida
Related: Jeffrey Epstein: sex abuse allegations against billionaire socialite began in 2005
Continue reading...Official praises ‘effective temporary measure’ using looped children’s song to drive away people from banqueting venue
City officials in West Palm Beach, Florida, are using extremely catchy children’s music to try and drive away homeless people from one of its civic buildings.
The city’s mayor, Keith James, confirmed to Fox News that the songs Baby Shark and Raining Tacos were being played at the patio of the Waterfront Lake Pavilion, where homeless people have been living.
Continue reading...US billionaire will reportedly appear before a federal magistrate on Monday
Jeffrey Epstein, the politically well-connected US billionaire, has been charged with sex trafficking, according to reports.
The New York Times reported that Epstein, a wealthy Florida financier, was arrested in the New York area and was in custody. He is expected to appear before a federal magistrate on Monday. The NYT cited two anonymous sources.
Continue reading...A vacant pizza restaurant exploded on Saturday in a thundering roar at a south Florida shopping plaza, injuring more than 20 people as large chunks of concrete flew through the air.
The blast flung debris widely along a busy road in Plantation, west of Fort Lauderdale. The restaurant was destroyed, and nearby businesses and cars were damaged.
Continue reading...President kicked off his bid with lies, attacks on the press and claims a Democrat president would ‘shut down your free speech’
Donald Trump has set the stage for the nastiest US presidential race in modern times with a campaign rally that recycled old themes and stoked resentment towards Democrats and the media.
Related: Trump's 2020 campaign launch: the key takeaways
Continue reading...After two and a half years in office, Trump remains fixated on the same grievances – and successes
Donald Trump launched his 2016 presidential campaign on 16 June 2015, by descending an escalator in front of a small crowd in Trump Tower. Four years on, he launched his 2020 pitch to be re-elected to the White House to 20,000 people at Orlando’s Amway Center on a humid, rainy Florida night.
Related: Trump 2020 launch: Bernie Sanders attacks president's 'lies' and 'distortions' – live
Continue reading...Sweltering heat, storms and possible twisters were expected to hit the southern plains and south-eastern states on Memorial Day, on the heels of deadly tornadoes and flooding.
Related: Are hurricanes getting stronger – and is the climate crisis to blame?
Continue reading...Lisa Noland, who helped police capture Bobby Joe Long, was 17 when he abducted her
A woman who survived an attack by a notorious Florida serial killer, and helped police to capture him, watched on Thursday evening as he was put to death for his crimes.
Lisa Noland looked on from the front row as Bobby Joe Long, whose 1984 killing spree claimed the lives of 10 women, was executed by lethal injection at Florida state prison.
Continue reading...An audience member at a Donald Trump rally in Florida yelled 'shoot them' in reference to migrants at the border. Trump had asked the crowd: 'How do you stop these people?' After laughing at the response, he added: 'Only in the panhandle can you get away with that statement'
Continue reading...Boeing 737 was landing at a naval airport when it ended up in the St Johns river but 143 passengers and crew survive
All 143 passengers and crew have escaped after a Boeing 737 plane skidded off a runway and landed in a river during a “terrifying” attempted landing at an airport in Jacksonville, Florida.
The military-chartered Miami Air international plane was trying to land in a thunderstorm at the naval air station in Jacksonville en route from Guántanamo Bay in Cuba at around 9.40pm local time when it slid off the runway into the St Johns river, a statement from the navy airport said.
Continue reading...Two Florida sheriff's deputies have been suspended after a video showed them pepper-spraying and punching a 15-year-old black student. The video, which was widely shared on social media last week, shows the two officers slamming Delucca Rolle to the ground and smashing his face into the concrete several times. Rolle’s family say he was picking up a cellphone that a classmate had dropped when one officer pepper-sprayed and jumped on him
Continue reading...Bird native to Australia and Papua New Guinea likely killed breeder with its long claws
A cassowary – a large, flightless bird native to Australia and Papua New Guinea – has killed its Florida owner when it attacked him after he fell.
The fire rescue department in Alachua county told the Gainesville Sun newspaper the cassowary killed the man on Friday on his property near Gainesville, in the north of the state, likely using its long claws. The victim, whose name was not released, was apparently breeding the birds, state wildlife officials said.
Continue reading...Authorities said three naked women who were seen applying suntan lotion at a Florida rest stop led police on a 21-mile chase, drove a car at one deputy and threatened another with a bat.
The Florida highway patrol said that when a deputy approached the women at the Interstate 75 rest stop on Wednesday in Dade City, Pasco county, they started dressing. The women told the trooper they had been staying at a relative’s home but went to the rest stop after an altercation and had nowhere else to go.
Continue reading...A second student from the Florida high school targeted in a mass shooting has died in little more than a week, police said on Sunday.
The boy was believed to be a survivor of the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas school on 14 February 2018 in which 17 people were killed and 17 wounded.
Continue reading...With the winding down of the ‘Winter White House’ comes another season of controversy and scandal that swirl around the president’s resort
At Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s waterfront winter retreat, an end-of-term air hangs over the expansive verandas and perfectly manicured lawns. In barely a month’s time, following the traditional season-closing Easter Sunday brunch gala, the private members’ club will be scrubbed and shuttered for the summer, its wealthy clientele dispersing to residences in the Hamptons or boarding their mega-yachts to cruise the Mediterranean.
Related: Trump's four 2017 Mar-a-Lago trips cost taxpayers nearly $14m, watchdog says
Continue reading...A company run by a donor to Donald Trump claimed it could provide Chinese clients with a chance to mingle and take photos with the president, along with access to his private club in Palm Beach, Florida.
Related: Trump in Super Bowl selfie with founder of spa in prostitution case
Continue reading...Florida sculpture of George Mendonsa and Greta Zimmer Friedman defaced as kiss comes under scrutiny
A statue in Florida depicting the US sailor famously photographed kissing a female stranger at the end of the second world war has been vandalised, with “#MeToo” written in red spray paint across the woman’s leg the day after the serviceman’s death.
Although the image of George Mendonsa kissing Greta Zimmer Friedman has long been heralded for epitomising the joy shared throughout the world upon the ending of hostilities in 1945, it has come under scrutiny more recently, with many accusing Mendonsa of assault.
Continue reading...Seventeen people were killed on 14 February 2018 at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school in Parkland, Florida. After the tragedy Parkland students united and campaigned for change
Continue reading...The Marjory Stoneman Douglas student was hailed as a hero for saving 20 students, but the teen only wants the freedom of playing on the field
When the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school commandeered the streets of Washington DC to march for their lives last year, Anthony Borges was still in a Florida hospital, fighting for his.
The soft-spoken 15-year-old, then a freshman at the school in Parkland, had been shot five times during the onslaught of violence on 14 February 2018, which left 17 students and teachers dead.
Continue reading...Plea deal, involving attorney who became Trump’s labor secretary, saw financier avoid severe penalty for abusing girls
The justice department has opened an investigation into federal prosecutors’ handling of a plea deal in which a wealthy, politically connected Florida financier avoided potentially severe penalties for sexually abusing teenage girls in favor of a relatively light state conviction.
The department’s Office of Professional Responsibility wrote in a letter Wednesday to the Republican senator Ben Sasse, of Nebraska, that it would examine whether professional misconduct occurred in the highly publicized case of Jeffrey Epstein. The letter cited a series of recent articles by the Miami Herald that focused new attention on how the deal came about.
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