VERO BEACH — A 26-year-old woman who was speeding and weaving out of traffic on Interstate 95 is guilty of vehicular homicide of two motorcyclists she hit along the roadway.

A jury deliberated for a hour Wednesday afternoon before finding Dominique Brice, of Miami, guilty of killing the motorcyclists parked along the northbound lanes on Feb. 29, 2008, near the juncture of Indian River and St. Lucie counties. (more…)

PORT CANAVERAL — Martha Jackson was watching a wedding video with her nephew when she heard the splash.

Soon after, the Nashville, Tenn., woman heard a man yelling.

“You could hear him hollering for help,” said Jackson, who was on the last night of a four-night cruise to the Bahamas.

Authorities have not released the name of the 34-year-old Philadelphia man who jumped from his sixth-deck suite aboard the Carnival Sensation late Wednesday. The man, who was on the cruise celebrating his wedding anniversary, was rescued 1 1/2 hours later by the Disney cruise ship Wonder off the coast of southern St. Lucie County. (more…)

PORT ST. LUCIE — Alfredo Felipe opened his new barber shop in Port St. Lucie because he liked the hometown feel of the community.

Felipe, 33, never thought that a month after his grand opening, an odd theft would occur at his business, Fredo’s Barbershop Hair Trends International, 698 Southwest Port St. Lucie Blvd.

Felipe said his homemade, 7-foot barber pole, made out of Styrofoam, mesh, stucco and some light metal materials, was stolen between 12:30 and 1:30 p.m. Friday at his shop.
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PORT ST. LUCIE — A man accused of shooting a pickup truck on Interstate 95 — killing a German shepherd puppy inside — faces a felony charge in a case that remains under investigation, according to a police spokesman and a report obtained Thursday.

Andy Phillips, 22, is accused of firing two shots around 1:45 a.m. Tuesday at a Toyota Tundra pickup with two people and the puppy inside as it headed south on I-95 near Southwest Becker Road.

The victims, Laritza Y. Fontela, 19, and 20-year-old Yosdany Rodriguez, are from Miami, and Fontela said they were in Port St. Lucie visiting relatives. The assailants reportedly continued south in a Toyota 4Runner after the shooting. (more…)

FORT PIERCE — Five men caught snipping “buds” off pot plants in a Port St. Lucie house in May 2008 face up to 11 years in prison after being convicted Friday of cultivating marijuana, possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia.

After a four-day trial at the St. Lucie County Courthouse, a jury deliberated about four hours Thursday evening and Friday morning before reaching guilty verdicts for Reinaldo R. Ramos, 35, of Hialeah, and Jose V. Alvarez-Hernandez, 55, Luis O. Leal, 33, Manuel Gonzalez, 35, and Jose Antonio Blain, 42, all of Miami.
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MIAMI — After a long and exhaustive investigation, the deaths of two infants and the sickening of a third at Miami Children’s Hospital is a medical mystery.

The infants, born extremely prematurely, their immune systems compromised, were in the hospital’s Neonatal Intensive Care Unit when two of them died of a common yet lethal bacterium in March. (more…)

PORT ST. LUCIE — A 22-year-old Port St. Lucie man has been charged in federal court with transporting child pornography after authorities found more than half a million child pornographic images on his computer hard drive, according to a news release Friday from the U.S. Department of Justice.

Jason David Bingham was detained Friday in Miami without bond and his arraignment is set for April 28.
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PORT ST. LUCIE — The Nelsons moved to Connecticut and had two additional children. Neil Spector got married and still lives in the area and Howard Hillegas has watched homes sprout up along his once-vacant street.

Their lives — like those of others who experienced that chaotic day — moved on in the decade since wildfires ripped through parts of western Port St. Lucie on April 15, 1999. It was described then as the worst disaster in city history, and one of the worst fires on the Treasure Coast.

But the memories remain.
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Along with status and prestige, Treasure Coast celebrities and CEOs bring in beaucoup bucks to the local tax collector’s offices.

Pop star Celine Dion just shelled out $171,040 in property taxes for her 3.7-acre oceanfront Jupiter Island estate on the 200 block of South Beach Road.

Dion’s estate, which is registered under her Montreal-based company Renlec Management Inc., is on the same street as Richard Fuld Jr., the former chairman and chief executive officer of Lehman Brothers. He changed ownership of the $13.3 million Jupiter Island home on 265 Beach Road exclusively into his wife’s name almost two months after the company had the largest bankruptcy filing in U.S. history.

Public records show the couple plunked down $197,194 in property taxes on Nov. 11.

Professional golfer Greg Norman, who slashed the price of his famous barrier-island estate from $65 million to $47.5 million last year, also shares the same ZIP code as the Fulds and Dion. Tax records show Norman paid a whopping $326,751 in residential taxes last January on his 8-acre property, named “Tranquility,” at 382 South Beach Road.

Tiger Wood’s 12-acre site on the 400 block of South Beach Road still is under construction, but his future property taxes could beat out Norman’s bill in the future.

County records show Sand Turtle LLC, the entity registered as the owner of the Woods property, paid a $70,744 tax bill in November. Woods is building a 10,000-square-foot, two-story home with an elevator, guest house, guardhouse and boathouse. The property stretches from the Intracoastal Waterway to the Atlantic Ocean.

Taxes seem a little more reasonable in Indian River County. Author and journalist Carl Hiaasen and his wife Fenia paid Vero Beach their $16,988 property tax bill on Nov. 5.

“I think these people, the celebrities, we do have here are very quiet about it,” said Janet Vizzo, a manager at the Martin County Tax Collector’s Office. “It’s not very well known.” (more…)

FORT PIERCE — A man authorities said “built out” marijuana grow house interiors was convicted Wednesday afternoon of conspiracy, trafficking in marijuana and racketeering.

Dennis Enrique Rondon, 32, of Port St. Lucie, is the first of about a dozen defendants connected to Global Home Builders Inc., a construction company authorities allege was a cover for a marijuana growing operation, to be tried and convicted.

On Nov. 27, 2007, the father-and-son Global Home owners, Roberto Alberto Cepero, 46, of Port St. Lucie, and Roberto Patricio Cepero, 24, of Miami, as well as Rondon and 18 other people, were arrested in raids yielding 10 marijuana grow houses and more than 400 pounds of marijuana.

Rondon was charged with conspiracy to traffic in marijuana and trafficking in more than 25 pounds of marijuana. On Dec. 12, 2007, a racketeering charge was added.

He equipped houses for growing marijuana; and during the trial that started April 1, jurors were shown light fixtures, wiring and electrical panels taken from seven of the grow houses, as well as numerous marijuana plants ranging in size from about a foot to about 6 feet tall.

“In all, there were more than 100 pieces of evidence,” said Assistant State Attorney Daryl Isenhower, “including over 100 pounds of marijuana, some of it still growing and some of it hung up and drying.”

Jurors deliberated about four hours before reaching the guilty verdict.

Rondon faces at least three years in prison, the mandatory minimum sentence for trafficking, and up to 90 years — 30 for each of the three first-degree felonies. Circuit Judge Larry Schack has scheduled a May 1 status hearing on the case.

By Tyler Treadway, TCPalm.com