Feminists in topless pope protest at Paris' Notre Dame

AFP

Activists from the women's rights organization Femen protest in front of Notre-Dame de Paris Cathedral in Paris today.

PARIS — Topless women activists have pounded a huge church bell in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris to "celebrate" the pope's resignation.

The nine women from Ukrainian feminist group Femen had their chests and backs emblazoned with the words "Pope No More." They didn't explain their action except to say they are "provocateurs" celebrating Pope Benedict XVI's decision to step down.

At one point the women rang an enormous bell on display in the hall of the landmark cathedral, part of a set of new bronze bells cast for Notre Dame's 850th anniversary this year. Cathedral staff turned off the church lights and pulled the women away.

The women say they're also protesting in support of gay marriage. France's lower house of parliament is voting Tuesday on whether to legalize it.

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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.

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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.

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Kerry Washington Channing Tatum Independent Spirit Awards Presenters Exclusive

Given their host (Joel McHale, Rainn Wilson, Seth Rogen, John Waters, Andy Samberg) and nominee track record, The Film Independent Spirit Awards have long been one of my favorite award shows -- and don't even get me started on the sublime singing!

RELATED - Who's Presenting at The Oscars

This year's ceremony is set to be their most star-studded to date. Not only are Jennifer Lawrence, Matthew McConaughey, Bruce Willis nominated, but ETonline can exclusively reveal that Kerry Washington, Channing Tatum, Kyle MacLachlan and Zachary Booth will be presenters on the big night!

McConaughey earned one of his two 2013 nominations for Tatum's movie, Magic Mike, while Booth's insanely good indie, Keep The Lights On, scored nods for Best Director, Best Screenplay and Best Male Lead.

RELATED - 2013 Spirit Award Nominations

MacLachlan has been a Spirit Awards staple since Blue Velvet dominated the 1987 ceremony and Washington was nominated for Best Female Lead for 2002's Lift.

The 2013 Film Independent Spirit Awards air February 23 at 10 p.m. on IFC.

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Village 'bomb ma' pleads not guilty to explosives, drugs charges

The accused Greenwich Village "Bomb Mom" took a whirl-wind tour of Manhattan Criminal Court today, visiting judges in two courtrooms for her ongoing explosives, grand larceny and heroin possession cases.

Park Avenue-raised oncologist's daughter Morgan Gliedman, 27, pleaded not guilty this morning to a scary, headlines-making cache of explosives powder and two shotguns found in the West 9th Street apartment back in December.

The then nine-months-pregnant Dalton grad had shared the posh pad with her baby daddy, Aaron Greene, 31, who remains jailed on the same powder and weapons possession indictment.

Dan Brinzac

Morgan Gliedman

Both Greene and Gliedman are heroin addicts, their lawyers have said. Gliedman, who had stopped using drugs during her pregnancy, and went into labor shortly after getting arrested in December.

Gliedman was bailed out last month to an in-patient rehab program; her healthy baby girl, Melody Sunshine, was being cared for by Gliedman's father, Dr. Paul Gliedman, head of radiation oncology at Beth Israel Brooklyn, and her mother, realtor Susan Schops Gliedman.

Cops had stumbled upon the powder and weapons when they visited the couple's posh apartment to question Gliedman about her alleged theft of a wallet, a MacBook and other electronics from the home of a man she'd met at a bar and gone home with overnight a year ago.

She was already on probation at the time for her third and oldest case: for drug possession charge after getting arrested in a car in Harlem with Greene, who was caught injecting heroin.

The two judges handling all three cases set April 2 for Gliedman's next court date.

"She's compliant, she's doing well, and she's following the advice of her counsel," said her lawyer, Gerald Shargel.

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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.”

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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.

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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. 

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Obama declares state of emergency for Connecticut following snowstorm

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama has declared a state of emergency for Connecticut after the massive storm that blanketed the state with several feet of snow.

The order means federal money will be used to help state and local response efforts. The White House announced the declaration Sunday.

Obama authorized the Federal Emergency Management Agency to provide equipment and resources needed to help storm recovery.

The storm dumped at as much as 3 feet of snow on Connecticut, paralyzing much of the state. All roads in the state were closed, and even emergency responders got stuck on highways. The National Guard was brought in to help clear snow in New Haven, which got 34 inches.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy says five deaths apparently were weather related.

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Mega mansion frenzy: Buyer snaps up Pat Riley’s $16M home to level it, rebuild

Miami Heat President Pat Riley sold his spectacular bayfront mansion in gated Gables Estates for $16.8 million last March.

The 12,856-square-foot Mediterranean-style dream house at 180 Arvida Parkway has a theater, wine cellar, library, and a sprawling pool with waterfalls and an aqua bar.

But that’s all coming down.

Turns out the lure was the lot: a rare fingertip of prime land, nearly two acres, jutting into the turquoise waters of Biscayne Bay.

In December, the buyer — listed as 180 Arvida LLC represented by Miami attorney Mark Hasner — presented the city of Coral Gables with plans to tear down the home, built in 1991, and erect an even grander estate along the 900 linear feet of bayfront.

“Most people would move in and be perfectly happy, but clients are looking for perfection — really good stuff,” said Jorge Uribe, a senior vice president at One Sotheby’s International Realty, who wasn’t involved but sold an even bigger trophy property last year: a $39.4 million estate at 14 Indian Creek Dr., in Indian Creek Village, dubbed “Miami’s Billionaire Bunker” by Forbes magazine.

“The trend in the last several years is a demand for very high-quality product. People are looking for really good locations, really good materials, and they’re willing to pay for it,” Uribe said.

Miami’s ultra-luxury market is on fire. Prices for the fanciest single-family homes and condominiums have soared to levels never before seen in the area, fueled by strong foreign demand and renewed interest from New Yorkers and others in the Northeast.

With Miami’s global image burnished by Art Basel Miami Beach and the debut of other cultural and entertainment venues, the city is emerging as an even greater magnet for the world’s super-rich.

In January, a penthouse at the Setai Resort & Residences on Miami Beach fetched $27 million, a new high for a Miami-Dade condominium. “Every building we do business in is at its highest price of all time,” said Mark Zilbert, president of Zilbert International Realty, which represented the buyer in the Setai deal.

Last August, a sleek, new home, built on spec at 3 Indian Creek Dr., sold for $47 million, a record high for a Miami-Dade residence. The buyer, whose identity has not been revealed, is Russian.

“People are realizing how valuable the bay waterfront is,” said Oren Alexander, co-founder of the Alexander Group at Douglas Elliman Real Estate, who co-listed the 3 Indian Creek property with The Jills team at Coldwell Banker and represented the buyer for the home. His father, Shlomy Alexander, developed the property with partner Felix Cohen.

Shlomy Alexander is working on two more extravagant spec homes — one at 30 Indian Creek Dr. and a second that is set to break ground shortly at 252 Bal Bay Dr. in Bal Harbour, his son said. Plans envision a tropical modern-style project that fuses the indoors and outdoors — a concept popular in Brazil.

The elder Alexander recently traveled to Italy to shop for exclusive stone for the projects, said the son.

“It’s really trending to the ultra-luxury. All sorts of exotic materials — exotic woods, exotic marbles, exotic stones,” said Sean Murphy, an executive vice president at Coastal Construction, a major builder of luxury hotels and condominiums that also has erected some of the most extravagant mansions in the region. “Everything is so exotic.”

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