On the eve of Christmas Eve, let's have a look at what's inside your local news stockings:
- Is that Jeffrey Epstein or Kris Kringle? The billionaire sex offender is handing out cash money settlements to girls who may have had an encounter with his lap. Four of them, for now. As for the 14 others? Coal, at least until you fire your Scrooge-like attorneys. [Palm Beach Post]
- More than two months after a group of vengeful boys set him on fire, Deerfield Beach's Michael Brewer left a hospital in Miami and will be home for Christmas. [Sun-Sentinel]
- Investigators say Paul Merhige withdrew $12,000 in advance of committing the Thanksgiving massacre in Jupiter as part of what they believe was a meticulous plan to make a clean getaway. Meanwhile, the family is asking for community support in distributing fliers with his picture. [Palm Beach Post]
- In what was an awful, wrenching case, Charles Sanford of Sunrise, who was convicted in the hit-and-run death of a 4-year-old girl, received a 5-year prison sentence -- far less than the girl's mother wanted. [WSVN]
- U.S. Reps. Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart are a couple of fairweather friends, it seems. They both yanked their endorsement of Charlie Crist in the race for U.S. Senate, just as his poll numbers have headed south. [Miami Herald]