U.S. journalist Cody Weddle, a freelancer for South Florida news outlets, feared detained in Venezuela

The family of a Caracas-based American reporter who freelances for South Florida news outlets fears he has been detained in Venezuela by the embattled government of Nicolas Maduro. According to media reports, the U.S.-based relatives of journalist Cody Weddle do not know what has happened to him but they think he was detained sometime around 8 a.m. Wednesday after authorities apparently raided his home in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital. Weddle’s sister Kelsey McMahan said the family has... Read More

Life in plastic: Celebrate Barbie’s 60th birthday at Wilton Manors ‘Art of Barbie’ party

It took six weeks of allowance and an agonizing wait before Constance Ruppender had scraped together enough savings – three bucks – to buy her first Barbie doll at a Woolworths in 1959. She was beautiful, slender and everything like the doll she saw advertised on “The Mickey Mouse Club,” with late-‘50s bubble-cut hair and a Jackie Kennedy-style orange coat and gray dress. To then-8-year-old Ruppender, she was perfect. Which perhaps explains why Ruppender never stopped buying... Read More

Officer injured in fall while training on tower

A Coral Springs police officer was injured in a fall from a tower during a training exercise Wednesday, officials said. The officer was airlifted to the hospital with several injuries, according to fire spokesman Mike Moser. His injuries are not life-threatening, said police spokesman Tyler Reik. The tower is about 40 feet tall, but it wasn’t immediately known where the officer fell from on the tower, Reik said. The officer’s name hasn’t been released. lhuriash@sunsentinel.com,... Read More

Exploring the Growing Trend of Taking a Gap Year before College

When chosen wisely, a gap year can meet a student exactly where they are and provide what they need to thrive in college. Each year, between 80 and 110 future Harvard students choose to take a gap year. They’re encouraged to pursue this option straight from the Admissions office. Why would one of the most prestigious schools in the country encourage high school grads to wait to go to college? Harvard isn’t the only school encouraging its applicants to consider this option.... Read More

The Church Growth Gap: The Big Get Bigger While the Small Get Smaller

The US congregations most likely to grow are the 10 percent that already have more than 250 worshipers. In many congregations in the United States, new faces in the pews have become rare. A new study from Exponential by LifeWay Research found 6 in 10 Protestant churches are plateaued or declining in attendance and more than half saw fewer than 10 people become new Christians in the past 12 months. “Growth is not absent from American churches,” said Scott McConnell, executive... Read More

What Shakespeare Taught Me About Ash Wednesday

On the first day of Lent, I’m reminded of a love that “alters not” and “bears it out even to the edge of doom.” Many years ago this winter, I published my first novel. That was a proud day for me. I had a sense of maybe having achieved something of lasting significance. The novel sold reasonably well, made it into a second and third reprinting, and was even brought out again in mass-market paperback. But three or four years after it first came out, my publisher told me the novel... Read More

Florida chief justice calls it ‘a sad day’ as Miami-Dade judge receives reprimand

With Chief Justice Charles Canady describing it as a “sad day,” the Florida Supreme Court on Tuesday publicly reprimanded a Miami-Dade County judge after an investigation into free hotel stays … Click to Continue » ... Read More

YNW Melly pleads not guilty in Miramar murders

Aspiring rapper Jamell Demons, known better by his stage name YNW Melly, has pleaded not guilty to charges he murdered his good friends Anthony Williams and Christopher Thomas Jr. in Miramar last October. Demons, 19, knew the victims since their childhood in Vero Beach, according to police. Demons’ friend, Cortlen Henry, is also charged in the murders. Both men are scheduled to appear before Broward Circuit Judge Andrew Siegel for formal arraignment later this month. Demons, Thomas... Read More

She’s in Texas, but men have been spending her money in South Florida

A woman in Texas doesn’t know how it happened, but her credit card company told her two men have been going on a shopping spree around Broward County using her account. Now, the Broward Sheriff’s Office is hoping someone will recognize the men seen on surveillance videos. Security cameras recorded them using a fraudulent credit card to buy more than $3,500 worth of merchandise at Publix supermarkets in November, investigators said. The thieves spent a total of $1079.53 in two trips to a... Read More