Donna Weaver didn’t look down on the leaden Atlantic Ocean below. Fighting the three-headed nightmare of fear, mourning, and nausea, she didn’t dare. Donna hated flying in even the largest jets, and this tin can hurtling above the Bahamas — a claustrophobia-inducing cylinder stuffed to capacity with 19 passengers and…

A high-rolling Miami developer came to Pembroke Park and left with a prized piece of public land. For their trouble, taxpayers stand to lose more than $3 million on the deal. The little Broward County town still doesn’t even know what hit it. Back in 2002, Pinnacle Housing Group agreed…

Ira Cor says he likes to stay behind the scenes. The real-estate broker contends he’s happy to get government deals done while the politicians — or “electeds,” as he calls them — take the credit. That’s one reason even some veteran political insiders don’t know exactly what Cor does. The…

After years of unlawful secrecy, profiteering, and nepotism by the Town of Southwest Ranches, things are finally changing. But its 7,000-some citizens need not worry; they can still look forward to plenty of unlawful secrecy, profiteering, and nepotism from their little government in the future. After I wrote an investigative…

Usually, the Broward State Attorney’s Office employs comedy to clear public officials accused of corruption. Vaudevillian top prosecutor Michael Satz and his lovable gang of incredibly inept investigators tie themselves into human knots to do it. With the investigative instinct of Clouseau and a knack for misinterpreting the law, their…

Arnold Goldman conducts some business on his cell phone. “Jorge, are you going to the site… Where are you?… Tell Robert that the repair man will be there tomorrow… mañana, not today, tomorrow, comprende?… No… tomorrow… mañana… not today… tomorrow… repair.” Goldman pauses and explains to me: “It’s difficult to…

In the court of public opinion, Parkland Mayor Bob Marks is charged with violating the people’s trust. He stands accused of accepting financial favor from the biggest developer in his town, WCI Communities, and then voting on dozens of issues that benefited the company. In effect, it is being alleged…

While a couple of dozen accused mobsters milled around outside Judge Stanton Kaplan’s courtroom last week, one of their lawyers summed up Broward County Sheriff Ken Jenne’s big stand against Cosa Nostra. “It’s all about the salmon,” attorney Alvin Entin remarked to fellow Mob defender Fred Haddad. “You shouldn’t fuck…

Ken Jenne thinks you’re an idiot. The Broward County sheriff believes us all to be morons. And if we let him stay in power after what he’s done, then he’s bloody well right. Jenne, as we all know, is at the heart of one of the largest law enforcement scandals…

Nobody should be more proud of Broward County’s recent vote for Vegas-style slot machines than state Sen. Steven Geller. During the recent slots debate, the Hallandale Beach Democrat slung quotes from here to the Panhandle, promoting the gaming industry at every turn. You might even have heard Geller’s gab on…

Tall and thin, Alfred Fisikelli walks on his land with a slight tilt of the head and a slow, respectful gait. “Watch that,” he cautions, pointing to a thin electrical wire running along the white PVC fence surrounding his cow pasture. “It’s hot.” Fisikelli, who goes by Freddy, is a…

Josephus Eggelletion knows how to keep his mouth shut. When it comes to his unethical lobbying work, the Broward County commissioner is lip-locked. Now, as allegations swirl that he had a sexual relationship with a teenaged student when he was a Dillard High School teacher and later fathered her child,…

This is the last in a series. To read the other parts, visit our Special Report Unusual Suspects. Not long before Rick Weed and Jane Gosnell were found dead in their bedroom, a man from their past named Roger Lee Sexton showed up at the Coral Springs estate they called…

Editor’s Note:The first part in the series told of the growing feud between millionaire Bobby Gordon and his wife Barbara’s friends, Rick Weed and Jane Gosnell. All four lived in Bobby’s home in Coral Springs until Barbara discovered the corpses of Rick and Jane in their bedroom. As Barbara Gordon…

She writes on a computer at her sprawling, million-dollar home in northwest Broward horse country. The office walls are covered with University of Miami sports memorabilia. That’s her husband’s stuff. Behind a steel cabinet is a loaded, pistol-handled, black, 12-gauge shotgun. That’s definitely hers. Barbara Gordon knows how to handle…

Finally, the governor is standing up for the famous subspecies of human often called by its scientific name, electis moronis. I am, of course, talking about you, the common voter. The voter is no stranger to scorn and humiliation; he is a creature that has adapted to ridiculous amounts of…

Here’s a tip for the wannabe land barons out there: The City of Hollywood is selling prime downtown land for peanuts. Just last month it gave away a $2.1 million tract of land on booming Young Circle for just $58,000. Get in on it while it lasts. Sure the taxpayers…

Vinnie Grande’s name doesn’t circulate much, but he’s still a player. In a few short years, Grande has become a power broker in Broward County, especially at the city halls of Lauderdale Lakes and Davie. Like all the really successful lobbyists in South Florida, he’s become an expert at earning…

Josephus Eggelletion’s people wait. The Broward County commissioner has called a town hall meeting at Dillard High School, and about 40 residents have shown up to hear what their man in office is doing for them. The 55-year-old politician, dressed in a gold-colored, U.S. Open golf shirt and black slacks,…

“I’m Earl Maucker, Sun-Sentinel editor. How can I help you?” Well, for starters, Earl, you can start acting like a journalist rather than a castrated helper monkey. If you can’t do that, go ahead and pour me a double vodka martini. And throw in a full frontal lobotomy. Then I…

Broward County Mayor Ilene Lieberman has insisted that she can keep her two identities, politician and lobbyist, completely separate. But several months ago, her personas collided at a Hollywood City Commission meeting — and a neighborhood that was largely forgotten in all the political posturing that followed will likely pay…

By the time you read this, you might know the identity of the next president. Or perhaps lawyers reign and the world’s fate is hanging, like so much chad, in the balance. Either way, Broward County is screwed. It’s stuck with a dysfunctional elections office that was plagued by technological…