City Council candidate suing BB King club after she's bit by rat, suit claims

Hit the rodent, Jack!

A Queens candidate for City Council is suing the BB King Blues Club & Grill, saying she was bitten by a rat as she watched a Ray Charles tribute concert at the Times Square nightclub.

Andrea Veras, 56, was celebrating her birthday with friends in September 2011 when “she was suddenly and violent bitten by a large rodent while seated in the patron seating area,” the Manhattan Supreme Court lawsuit claims.

“She started feeling something where her foot was. As they looked down with their cell phones to illuminate the ground they saw a giant rat and she was bleeding,” her attorney, Peter Panas, told The Post.

Panas described the biter as “a classic Norway rat.” Veras was wearing sandals and it broke the skin on her bare toe, he said.

The avid Brother Ray fan went to the doctor for the ensuing infection and fever, and was given seven days of antibiotics, her suit states.

Veras, who last month announced she was running for the council seat being vacated next year by the term-limited James Gennaro, still suffers “great physical pain, mental anguish, and expense,” from the rat attack, according to court papers.

The Legal Aid secretary works in Manhattan, and lives in Briarwood. She reported the incident to a club manager named Jonathan, who took a statement, but she was forced to file the lawsuit after the club ignored further communication, her attorney said.

B.B. King Blues Club & Grill denied the allegations.

The club has a “B” letter grade from the city’s Health Department. Two weeks after the rat incident the club racked up 12 sanitary violations including one that read “facility not vermin proof…conditions conducive to attracting vermin to the premises and/or allowing vermin to exist.”

The report also noted “evidence of mice or live mice present in the facility’s food and/or non-food areas.”

Veras is seeking unspecified damages.

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.CO sets sights on changing ‘the fabric of the Internet’

For the millions of people who equate the Web with .com, . CO Internet is out to change that mindset.

The Miami company that manages and markets the .co domain is already making impressive gains — more than 1.4 million in 200 countries have hung their businesses, blogs, personal projects or dreams on a .co virtual shingle. Still, that’s just a tiny fraction of industry titan VeriSign’s 105 million .com registrants.

“We want to change the fabric of the Internet,” Juan Diego Calle, founder and CEO of .CO Internet, said during an interview in .CO’s Brickell office. “We can only make that happen not by changing what happened in the last 25 years of the Web, which is owned by .com. We want to change the next 25.”

About 2½ years after the launch of .CO Internet, .co — the country code of Colombia — continues to be one of the fastest-growing Internet domains in the world and grew by 24 percent in 2012. .CO Internet is profitable and is projecting to bring in more than $25 million in revenues this year, the company said. The early success of .CO Internet, with operations in Miami and Colombia, is powered by passion and perseverance.

Calle moved to Miami from Colombia at age 15 with his family. He started several businesses, including one he sold in 2005 providing seed capital for what would come next. “I can’t say I ever sat still.” When he learned Colombia would be commercializing the country's .co domain extension in late 2006, he said it hit him like a lightning bolt.

With the right strategy and by “marketing the hell out of it,” the entrepreneur believed .co could solve a huge problem in the market — vanishing Internet domain names. If you’ve tried to nab a new .com address lately, you can relate — it’s difficult to find one that hasn’t been snatched up.

Calle thought that by appealing to the hearts and minds of the entrepreneur, .co could go where .info, .biz, .net or .me had never gone before. But first he needed the right team.

One of this first stops: The Big Apple, to visit Nicolai Bezsonoff, who had been an advisor and shareholder in Calle’s TeRespondo.com, a sort of Ask Jeeves for the Latin American market that was sold to Yahoo in 2005. At the time, Bezsonoff was the director of technology and operations at Citigroup.

“We went out for coffee, he started pitching me on a napkin. I said ‘really dude you want me to leave a big job at Citigroup for this?’ ” said Bezsonoff. “But he kept showing me the numbers … Later, that napkin was on my desk and it was one of those boring days and I kept looking at it and thought maybe I should.” He would become .CO’s chief operating officer.

Lori Anne Wardi, a lawyer and serial entrepreneur who was working at a venture capital firm at the time, became vice president in charge of brand strategy, business development and global communications. “She’s the heart and soul of the company,” said Calle. Eduardo Santoyo, based in Bogota, would become corporate vice president over policy and be the liaison with the Colombian government. “Some would say it was overkill talent but I needed the best. ... When you have a big dream, you have to think big and hire the right people,” Calle said.

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Priest to plead guilty Monday in underage sex case

One of South Florida’s most notorious priests — accused by multiple men of molesting them as youth — is expected to accept plead guilty to criminal charges Monday morning in Broward Circuit Court.

The Rev. Neil Doherty is scheduled to appear before Circuit Judge Kenneth Gillespie, where he will accept a plea deal, according to his lawyer, David Bogenschutz.

The details of the plea deal were not released Sunday.

Doherty, now retired from the Archdiocese of Miami, has served at several South Florida churches, including St. Vincent’s in Margate, St. Anthony in Fort Lauderdale and St. Phillip in Northwest Miami-Dade.

He has a long list of accusers who say he used his position of power to drug and rape them when they were boys. Some of the accusations date back to the 1970s but came to light only in recent years.

His accusers say Doherty used his position to molest young victims. In several cases, Doherty is accused of slipping drugs into drinks to make boys sleepy and molesting them while they were unconscious.

Documents released in 2006 as part of the Broward case included an interview with the priest’s longtime secretary, who said the archdiocese was aware of allegations that Doherty was having inappropriate relationships with young boys.

Despite the many civil suits filed against him, this will be the first criminal punishment for Doherty as a result of the accusations.

In most cases, criminal charges could not be filed because the statute of limitations had passed for alleged events.

However, several civil cases involving him have been settled out of court. The first case that went to a jury ended with a $100 million award to the victim.

In case before the court Monday, Doherty, 69, is charged with multiple counts of lewd or lascivious molestation, lewd acts in the presence of a child and sexual battery on a victim younger than 12, court records show.

Several people who say they, too, were victims of Doherty are expected in court Monday. They want to see his plea for themselves.

They hope the punishment will be strict, said Jeffrey Herman, a lawyer who represents many of the men.

“They are pleased Doherty will be convicted of a crime like this, but they don’t think he should be spending any time out of jail,” Herman said. “He’s dangerous.”

Doherty remained Sunday in Broward County’s Main Jail, held without bail.

Doherty spent three decades serving in Broward and Miami-Dade parishes, including time as the archdiocese’s director of vocations.

Doherty continued to serve as a priest until he was placed on administrative leave in 2002.

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HTC seeks Myanmar edge with local font phones

YANGON (Reuters) – Peter Chou, CEO of Taiwan smartphone company HTC Corp, will on Monday launch what he hopes will be a major boost to both a backward tech sector in Myanmar, his country of birth, and to his company’s share of one of the few untapped mobile markets: a phone that locals can use out of the box.

Until now, Chou says, Myanmarese users of mobile phones and computers must install fonts in their own language, a process that is cumbersome, often invalidates the device’s warranty and has, he says, slowed innovation and the embrace of technology.

HTC has instead teamed up with a local distributor and a software developer to customize Google’s Android operating system so its devices display local fonts and sport a dedicated and, Chou says, intuitive, Myanmar language onscreen keyboard.

“You don’t have to spend two months to learn how to type it,” Chou said in an interview ahead of the launch. “You just type it. We want to give people here a computing device they don’t have to learn. They just try it, they just use it, they just get it.”

Myanmar IT experts say that while the country’s alphabet is no more complex than some other Asian scripts, a failure to agree how to apply an international standard for language symbols called Unicode to existing versions of the computer font has made it difficult to bake the language into software.

As a result, web pages and apps will often be unreadable.

BIG CHALLENGES, LITTLE PENETRATION

The issue of fonts may seem a basic one, but reflects the challenges Myanmar faces in catching up with its neighbors as it sheds decades of military control over politics and the economy. Myanmar has one of the lowest mobile penetration rates in the world, with only 3 percent of the population owning a phone in 2011, according to the World Bank. In neighboring Bangladesh, 56 percent of people have a mobile phone.

When IT enthusiasts met last year for a conference on the future of technology called Barcamp Yangon, much of the discussion revolved around such basic issues, participants said. With at least two competing types of font software available, disagreements remain.

The problem is worse on smartphones, says Soe Ngwe Ya, general manager of KMD, HTC’s distribution partner for the new phones. In order to install such fonts on mobile devices users must first “root” the phone, effectively bypassing the manufacturer’s controls on customizing the phone’s operating system. That often invalidates any warranty. “It’s a major issue,” he says.

HTC also hopes it can claw back some ground from its biggest competitor in Android phones, Samsung Electronics, which has established a first mover advantage in Myanmar.

Samsung has at least two distributors for its handsets and its advertisements are visible around the capital. Soe says KMD will act as HTC’s distributor, open a flagship store and service HTC users.

Chou, who was born in Myanmar but left to work and study in Taiwan more than 30 years ago, says that at least for now the Myanmar fonts and keyboard will only be available on HTC devices. He denied that this undermined his claims of contributing to his homeland.

“While sometimes you can be idealistic,” he said, “the first thing you have to show the people is something to get excited about.”

(Editing by Ian Geoghegan)

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2013 Golden Globes Winners List

The Hollywood Foreign Press Association celebrates the best and brightest in Tinseltown -- find out who won a Golden Globe below. (Winners underlined.)

GALLERY - Best & Worst Golden Globe Gowns, Ever!

Best Picture, Drama

Argo

Django Unchained

Life of Pi

Lincoln

Zero Dark Thirty

Best Picture, Musical or Comedy

The Best Exotic Marigold

Les Miserables

Moonrise Kingdom

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

Silver Linings Playbook

Best Actor, Drama

Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln

Richard Gere, Arbitage

John Hawkes, The Sessions

Joaquin Phoenix, The Master

Denzel Washington, Flight

Best Actress, Drama

Jessica Chastain, Zero Dark Thirty

Marion Cottilard, Rust & Bone

Helen Mirren, Hitchcock

Naomi Watts, The Impossible

Rachel Weisz, Deep Blue Sea

Best Actor, Musical or Comedy

Jack Black, Bernie

Bradley Cooper, Silver Linings Playbook

Hugh Jackman, Les Miserables

Ewan McGregor, Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

Bill Murray, Hyde Park on Hudson

Best Actress, Musical or Comedy

Emily Blunt, Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

Judi Dench, The Best Exotic Marigold

Jennifer Lawrence, Silver Linings Playbook

Maggie Smith, Quartet

Meryl Streep, Hope Springs

VIDEO - Golden Globe Flashback: Ben Affleck's 1998 Win!

Best Supporting Actor

Alan Arkin, Argo

Leonardo DiCaprio, Django Unchained

Philip Seymour Hoffman, The Master

Tommy Lee Jones, Lincoln

Christoph Waltz, Django Unchained

Best Supporting Actress

Amy Adams, The Master

Sally Field, Lincoln

Anne Hathaway, Les Miserables

Helen Hunt, The Sessions

Nicole Kidman, The Paperboy

Best Animated Feature

Brave

Frankenweenie

Hotel Transylvania

Rise of the Guardians

Wreck-It Ralph

Best Director

Ben Affleck, Argo

Kathryn Bigelow, Zero Dark Thirty

Ang Lee, Life of Pi

Steven Spielberg, Lincoln

Quentin Tarantino, Django Unchained

Best Screenplay

Zero Dark Thirty

Lincoln

Silver Linings Playbook

Django Unchained

Argo

VIDEO - Golden Globe Flashback: Brad Pitt in 1996

Best Series, Drama

Breaking Bad

Boardwalk Empire

Downton Abbey

Homeland

The Newsroom

Best Actor, Drama

Steve Buscemi, Boardwalk Empire

Bryan Cranston, Breaking Bad

Jeff Daniels, The Newsroom

Jon Hamm, Mad Men

Damian Lewis, Homeland

Best Actress, Drama

Connie Britton, Nashville

Glenn Close, Damages

Claire Danes, Homeland

Michelle Dockery, Downton Abbey

Julianna Margulies, The Good Wife

Best Series, Musical or Comedy

The Big Bang Theory

Episodes

Girls

Modern Family

Smash

Best Actor, Comedy or Musical

Alec Baldwin, 30 Rock

Don Cheadle, House of Lies

Louis C.K., Louie

Matt LeBlanc, Episodes

Jim Parsons, The Big Bang Theory

Best Actress, Comedy or Musical

Zooey Deschanel, New Girl

Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Veep

Lena Dunham, Girls

Tina Fey, 30 Rock

Amy Poehler, Parks and Recreation

RELATED - The 2012 Screen Actors Guild Award Nominations

Best Mini-Series or TV Movie

Game Change

The Girl

Hatfields & McCoys

The Hour

Political Animals

Best Actor Mini-Series or TV Movie

Kevin Costner, Hatfields & McCoys

Benedict Cumberbatch, Sherlock

Woody Harrelson, Game Change

Toby Jones, The Girl

Clive Owen, Hemingway & Gellhorn

Best Actress Mini-Series or TV Movie

Nicole Kidman, Hemingway & Gellhorn

Jessica Lange, AHS: Asylum

Sienna Miller, The Girl

Julianne Moore, Game Change

Sigourney Weaver, Political Animals

Best Supporting Actor, TV Series, Mini-Series, TV Movie

Max Greenfield, New Girl

Ed Harris, Game Change

Danny Huston, Magic City

Mandy Patinkin, Homeland

Eric Stonestreet, Modern Family

Best Supporting Actress, TV Series, Mini-Series, TV Movie

Hayden Panettiere, Nashville

Archie Panjabi, The Good Wife

Sarah Paulson, Game Change

Maggie Smith, Downton Abbey

Sofia Vergara, Modern Family

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NRA says Congress will not pass assault weapons ban

WASHINGTON — The powerful gun lobby is gauging enough support in Congress to block a law that would ban assault weapons, despite promises from the White House and senior lawmakers to make such a measure a reality.

Senators plan to introduce a bill that would ban assault weapons and limit the size of ammunition magazines, like the one used in the December shooting massacre that killed 27 people, most of them children, in Newtown, Conn. Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California has promised to push for a renewal of expired legislation.

The National Rifle Association has so far prevented passage of another assault weapons ban like the one that expired in 2004. But some lawmakers say the Newtown tragedy has transformed the country, and Americans are ready for stricter gun laws. President Barack Obama has made gun control a top priority. And on Tuesday Vice President Joe Biden is expected to give Obama a comprehensive package of recommendations for curbing gun violence.

Bloomberg

The NRA is confident Congress won't ban semi-automatic assault rifles, like these made by Bushmaster, in the wake of the Newtown school shooting.

Still, the NRA has faith that Congress would prevent a new weapons ban.

"When a president takes all the power of his office, if he's willing to expend political capital, you don't want to make predictions. You don't want to bet your house on the outcome. But I would say that the likelihood is that they are not going to be able to get an assault weapons ban through this Congress," NRA president David Keene told CNN's "State of the Union."

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., responded with a flat out "no" when asked on CBS' "Face the Nation" whether Congress would pass a ban on assault weapons.

Democratic West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, a lifelong member of the NRA has said everything should be on the table to prevent another tragedy like Newtown. But he assured gun owners he would fight for gun rights at the same time. "I would tell all of my friends in NRA, I will work extremely hard and I will guarantee you there will not be an encroachment on your Second Amendment rights," Manchin said on ABC's "This Week."

The NRA's deep pockets help bolster allies and punish lawmakers who buck them. The group spent at least $24 million in the 2012 elections — $16.8 million through its political action committee and nearly $7.5 million through its affiliated Institute for Legislative Action. Separately, the NRA spent some $4.4 million through July 1 to lobby Congress. Keene insists the group represents its members and not just the gun manufacturers, though he said the NRA would like industry to contribute more money to the association.

"We know what works and what doesn't work. And we're not willing to compromise on people's rights when there is no evidence that doing so is going to accomplish the purpose," Keene said.

The NRA, instead, is pushing for measures that would keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill, until a person gets better. "If they are cured, there ought to be a way out of it," Keene said.

Currently, a person is banned from buying a gun from a licensed dealer if the person is a fugitive, a felon, convicted of substance abuse, convicted of domestic violence, living in the U.S. illegally or someone who "has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution."

States, however, are inconsistent in providing information about mentally ill residents to the federal government for background checks. And, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence said some 40 percent of gun sales happen with no background checks, such as at gun shows and by private sellers over the Internet or through classified ads.

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Miami Dolphins worry Marlins stand between them and a tax-funded roof for Sun Life Stadium

The Miami Dolphins are reviving their failed bid to win tax dollars for a football stadium. But team executives want no comparisons to a successful bid to win tax dollars for a baseball stadium.

Dolphins owner Stephen Ross has called a press conference for Monday to unveil a plan for an improved Sun Life Stadium. Sources say the plan will include asking state and local governments to help pay for a $400 million renovation of the 1987 facility.

State lawmakers in recent years rebuffed the Dolphins when the team asked for help on a less expensive renovation. And while the economy and state finances are more favorable this time around, Dolphin executives see a bigger challenge now from lingering backlash against the $639 million ballpark taxpayers built for the Miami Marlins.

“It can’t be anything close to what the Marlins did,’’ said state Sen. Oscar Braynon, a Democrat whose Miami Gardens district includes Sun Life Stadium and who sponsored a 2011 bill to raise hotel taxes to fund the Dolphins renovation plan. “Unless you do something totally counter to what the Marlins did, nobody is going to vote for it.”

Polls showed Miami and Miami-Dade’s 2009 votes to build the baseball stadium with 75 percent public money were never popular. But the Marlins’ recent stripping of star players from their payroll has made the new Little Havana park Topic A when it comes to plotting a Dolphins’ victory for winning tax dollars themselves.

Both the Marlins and the Dolphins declined to comment for this story. The Dolphins have not released details of how they want to pay for the renovation.

Dolphins executives plan to pursue two funding sources from state and local government, according to several people familiar with the team’s plans. For the first funding stream, the Dolphins plan to ask Miami-Dade to raise taxes charged mainland hotels from 6 percent to 7 percent and earmark the extra money for the stadium. The Dolphins also plan to ask Florida for an additional $2 million rebate on sales taxes on top of the $2 million the stadium already receives from the state each year under a special subsidy for professional sports teams.

Ross is expected to pledge a significant amount of the renovation money himself. Sources who have been briefed on the Dolphins’ proposal say the total pricetag for the project is $400 million. That’s almost double the renovation budget the Dolphins proposed when the team last went to the Legislature for money in 2011.

At the time, the Dolphins unveiled a $225 million redo of Sun Life with expanded sideline seating, high-definition lighting and a partial roof that would both shade seats during hot games and shield spectators from the kind of downpour that drenched the stands during the 2007 Super Bowl in Miami Gardens. The Dolphins, top executives at the NFL and some community leaders have warned that without upgrades to Sun Life, South Florida risks losing its standing as one of the nation’s top venues for the Super Bowl and college football championships.

“We need to keep up with the times,’’ said Phillis Oeters, the chair of the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce. “Sports is big, big business here.”

Backlash against the 2009 Marlins deal was an obstacle when the Dolphins asked for tax money in 2010 and 2011, but the baseball team’s unloading of ace Josh Johnson, star shortstop Jose Reyes and other stand-out players in November revived public anger against the financing arrangement.

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Woman dies after boat crashes in Biscayne Bay

A woman died after the boat her husband was piloting crashed into a concrete piling underneath the McArthur Causeway bridge late Saturday, officials said.

The woman, who has not been identified, tried to push the red and white 18-foot boat in another direction when they began to veer toward a piling underneath the bridge, said Jorge Pino, spokesman for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Her body somehow became lodged between the boat and the piling, Pino said.

Investigators did not know exactly how fast the boat was moving during the crash.

“We believe the vessel was going slow at the time of the impact,” Pino said. “Nothing at this point would indicate speeding.”

The woman was taken to Ryder Trauma Center where she later died.

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RIM shares climb as investors bet on new BlackBerry

TORONTO (Reuters) – Shares of Research In Motion rallied on Friday as investors positioned themselves ahead of the launch of its new make-or-break BlackBerry 10 smartphones at the end of the month.

Morningstar analyst Brian Colello did not see any one news story driving the stock, which climbed steadily through much of the day. The new phones are to be formally unveiled on January 30.

“The stock has been extremely volatile, based on BlackBerry 10 rumors and the potential for success in the market,” said Colello.

Several blog posts published on Friday showed purportedly leaked photos of what could be the new phones, and a number of tech sites confirmed that Sprint Nextel Corp would carry BlackBerry 10.

“Sprint plans to bring BlackBerry 10 to our customers later this year. We will share more details soon,” Mark Elliot, a spokesman for the U.S. carrier, said in an email.

Earlier this week, executives at Verizon Communications, AT&T Inc and T-Mobile USA all confirmed they would carry the smartphones, and said they are looking forward to the new devices.

“There are, I think, good indications that they’re going to get a seat at all the tables that matter,” said IDC analyst John Jackson, who called carrier support “necessary, but not sufficient” to ensure the success of BlackBerry 10.

Throughout the autumn of 2012, RIM’s stock rose as investors grew more optimistic about BlackBerry 10. Morningstar’s Colello said the market went from pricing in no chance of success, to betting on at least some chance of success for the new products.

But the rally broke off after RIM reported earnings in December, revealing that it would roll out a new fee structure for its services segment which some fear could put pressure on the high-margin business.

The new line’s success is crucial to the future of RIM, which has lost ground to competitors such as Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics, and in December reported its first-ever decline in total subscribers.

BGC Partners analyst Colin Gillis said the news that all four major U.S. carriers would offer BlackBerry 10 was likely lifting the stock, along with Nokia’s stronger-than-expected quarterly results — a sign that Google Inc’s Android smartphones have not completely taken over its market.

“The smartphone market is one of the most robust, largest markets in the world … it’s also dynamic,” said Gillis. “The winners and losers are going to be shifting. That said, it’s a difficult road the company is facing.”

RIM’s Nasdaq-listed shares were up 13.2 percent at $ 13.49. Shares jumped 12.6 percent to C$ 13.27 on the Toronto Stock Exchange. That more than doubled the price since the low of C$ 6.10 it touched in September. By late afternoon, RIM was the day’s most heavily-traded stock on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

(Additional reporting by Nicola Leske in New York; Editing by Marguerita Choy and Alden Bentley)

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Olivia Wilde and Jason Sudeikis Engaged

Olivia Wilde, 28, and Saturday Night Live star Jason Sudeikis, 38, are engaged, ET can confirm.

The pair, who went public in December of 2011, moved in together last year and have been seemingly inseparable since.

Related: Olivia Wilde Divorces Italian Royal

According to People, Sudeikis proposed to the Tron: Legacy star shortly after the holidays.

"They are so excited," says a source. "And very, very happy."

No word yet on a wedding date.

Video: Olivia Wilde Steams Up the Screen

This will be the second wedding for Wilde, whose divorce to Italian royal Tao Ruspoli was finalized in late September of 2011.

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