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Thomas Francis

Thomas Francis

Thomas Francis

Hole in One for 4-Year-Old Boy From Boca

By Thomas FrancisAugust 3, 2009

DayPortPlayer.newPlayer({articleID:”13845″,bannerAdObjectID:”5″,videoAdObjectID:”4″,videoAdConDefID:”2″,playerInstanceID:”24FAD9E0-DC70-2532-414F-7E6F051C4C2F”,domain:”wptv.dayport.com”,rootCategory:”null”,categoryID:”3″,accPos:”CCTVI.SPORTS.LOCAL”,accSite:”WPTV”}); A nearly Guinness Book record-setting stroke of beginner’s luck. Poor kid may spend the rest of his life trying to repeat the feat.Tiger Woods made his first hole in one at age 6.UPDATE: Just found this. The oldest man to hit a hole-in-one did it in Deerfield Beach: 101-year-old…

Broward Kids Sweep Junior PGA Championships

By Thomas FrancisAugust 3, 2009

By now, everybody knows about Alexis Thompson, the Coral Springs girl who at 14 is among the most promising female golfers in the game. To no one’s surprise, she dominated this past weekend’s Junior PGA Championship in Mainville, Ohio, winning by 12 strokes, just one off the tournament record.But T.J…

Search for Airline More Spartan Than Spirit Ends in Ireland

By Thomas FrancisJuly 31, 2009

Quick, someone block the New York Times website on the computer of Spirit Airlines CEO Ben Baldanza. The head of the Miramar-based discount carrier will be devastated if he learns that there’s another airline that is more ruthless about achieving low fares (a Baldanza obsession) and more willing to offend…

On Front Lines of Poverty War, Conflict Between Broward Agencies

By Thomas FrancisJuly 31, 2009

With Florida experiencing record unemployment rates, it’s critical that the nonprofit agencies helping low-income people find jobs get along with one another. But the stress has begun to fray relations between at least two Broward County agencies with an important role in that mission.Positive Image is the nonprofit agency that…

Things Not to Do on a Condo Staircase

By Thomas FrancisJuly 31, 2009

That’s the sketch of an alleged flasher who struck in Lauderdale Lakes a few days ago. Broward Sheriff’s deputies want your help finding him. But is this really a flasher? Or an unlucky guy caught having a private moment in a public place? Here’s the BSO release:At around noon on…

Bitchin’ Car, Al! But How Will You Explain It to Stacy?

By Thomas FrancisJuly 31, 2009

The Broward Sheriff’s Office is rolling out a fleet pair of 2009 Dodge Challengers,* but if this is the first you’ve heard about it, that’s probably because they arrive amid a fierce round of budget slashing in other county agencies. Not exactly a climate for bragging about muscle cars.It’s a…

Canadian Snowbird Facing Ponzi Charges

By Thomas FrancisJuly 31, 2009

Yet another part-time resident of Palm Beach County is facing allegations of financial fraud. Earl Jones, who ran an investment firm based in Montreal, but who since 1992 has had a condo in Boca Raton, is accused of a $50 million Ponzi scheme, mostly with Canadian investors.Jones had been missing…

Fraud Expert From Fort Lauderdale Linked to Stanford Case

By Thomas FrancisJuly 31, 2009

Thomas Cash, who lives in Fort Lauderdale but who for years has been the chairman of Kroll, Inc., the risk consulting firm in Miami, resigned from that position last week amid allegations that he helped mislead investors who sustained losses in the alleged Ponzi scheme for which Allen Stanford has…

Why Can’t the Monster Make His Home in Our Lake Worth?

By Thomas FrancisJuly 31, 2009

Near the city of Fort Worth, Texas, there’s a Lake Worth — a city that’s next to an actual lake, not a lagoon like Florida’s Lake Worth. And according to the Star-Telegram, this summer marks an anniversary of a ghoulish sighting that has earned a place in local legend. The…

Embattled Hospital Commissioner Considering Legal Defense Fund

By Thomas FrancisJuly 31, 2009

North Broward Hospital District Commissioner Joseph Cobo, the subject of a pending criminal investigation for allegedly using his public position to help business in his private consulting firm, has asked the district’s legal department for permission to establish a legal defense fund.The answer, which Juice obtained through a public records…

Aronberg Derails Gravy Train for State Contractors

By Thomas FrancisJuly 30, 2009

Sen. Dave Aronberg of Greenacres has convinced the Florida Department of Transportation to abandon its practice of awarding automatic annual raises to private contractors, and now the Florida attorney general candidate is going after other state agencies.As Juice reported a few weeks ago, “escalation clauses” are a boom-era fad that…

Killer of 16-Year-Old Hollywood Girl Sentenced

By Thomas FrancisJuly 30, 2009

An Anderson, South Carolina, man was sentenced today to 40 years in prison after he entered a guilty plea to the April 2007 murder of Talia Ashley, a 16-year-old runaway from Hollywood.Anderson’s Independent Mail reports that Stanley Dehart, now 30, confessed to hitting Ashley with a rock, then burning a…

Hallandale Beach Police Union Dispute Makes Strange Bed Partners

By Thomas FrancisJuly 30, 2009

  That’s a video of a recent protest by the Broward County Police Benevolent Association, which is turning up the heat on Hallandale Beach City Manager Mike Good for stalling on contract talks with the city’s cops. But since that hasn’t worked, the PBA has moved to phase two, circulating…

Hollywood Man to Compete for Best American Truck Driver

By Thomas FrancisJuly 30, 2009

That’s a trailer from a UPS-sponsored documentary about last year’s Truck Driving Championships. This year, Hollywood is sending Florida’s finest big-rig pilot: Patrick Condon, who prevailed in the recent statewide competition in Tampa.Sadly, these championships are sanctioned by the American Trucking Associations, which means they reward safety rather than dare-devilry…

For Wexler, It’s Hard to Be Good Cop When White House Is So Bad

By Thomas FrancisJuly 30, 2009

By helping Obama win Florida, Congressman Robert Wexler earned himself a higher profile in Washington, but the new administration has also placed him in some no-win foreign-policy situations.Wexler, who is Jewish and has a large Jewish constituency in his central Palm Beach and north Broward district, has the unenviable task…

Can We Add Switzerland to “Axis of Evil”?

By Thomas FrancisJuly 30, 2009

For all the hand-wringing over the North Koreas and Irans of the world, you’d be hard-pressed to find a single nation whose diabolical deeds have done more to undermine the U.S.’s global standing than the world’s peace-loving champions of neutrality. The case against UBS in Fort Lauderdale’s federal court has…