College student seeks immunity in South Miami man’s stabbing death

James Arauz, the Miami Dade College student who stabbed his mother’s employer to death, testified Thursday in the first day of a hearing to determine whether he would be granted Stand Your Ground immunity.

Arauz, who was 20 at the time, stabbed Vincent Pravata to death and went on a shopping spree with his credit cards in Oct. 2009. Investigators later found bloody fingerprints on a glass that led them to Arauz, who confessed to the murder and claimed self-defense.

The defendant’s mother worked as a housekeeper for Pravata for eight years and Arauz helped do yardwork for four months.

After Arauz’s father died from a heart attack in 2008, the 63-year-old Pravata offered to act as a mentor.

Arauz, an engineering student, testified that Pravata, who was openly gay, occasionally made comments about Arauz’s “beautiful eyes” and asked if he’d ever thought about gay sex.

The defendant’s mother said Pravata was unusually excited when Arauz broke up with his girlfriend less than a month before the stabbing.

From the witness stand Thursday, Arauz said he went to Pravata’s South Miami home to pick up the letter of recommendation he had requested for an internship application.

He said Pravata demanded sexual favors in exchange for the letter.

When Arauz rejected Pravata’s advances and tried to leave, he said the older man “went into a rage and tried to pin me against a wall”

After a chase and physical resistance, Arauz grabbed a decorative knife off a filing cabinet and stabbed Pravata 18 times when he tried to prevent him from opening a metal gate outside the house.

“I had already tried flight and it didn’t work, so I was trying to fight,” Arauz said, describing the desperate struggle for the knife. “It was the survival instinct.”

As Arauz was moving the body back into the house, he saw the victim’s wallet in his pocket and took his credit cards and $480 cash.

Arauz was also facing an outstanding shoplifting charge at the time. He was charged with second degree murder and credit card theft.

Judge Yvonne Colodny will hear further testimony on Friday and decide whether to grant the motion for immunity. If she decides that the defense has not provided enough evidence for Stand Your Ground, the case will go to trial before a jury.

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Gangster Squad Behind The Scenes Video

Following July's tragic Aurora, Colorado theater shooting, Warner Brothers postponed the September 7 release of Gangster Squad out of sensitivity given the fact one of it's standout set-pieces was a violent scene set in a movie theater.

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The film underwent reshoots to omit the scene in question, and is now set to hit theaters on January 11, 2013.

To begin re-hyping Gangster Squad, a new behind-the-scenes featurette has been released, revealing the high expectations Ruben Fleischer's cast has for this mob drama.

TRAILER: Gangster Squad

"This is the first big gangster movie for the new generation," Anthony Mackie says, with Giovanni Ribisi adding, "It's taking gangster films to the next level." The director goes on to reveal just how lofty his expectations for this film are: "Every generation has their iconic gangster film and we hope this will be the next one."

The 1949-set film, which sees a ruthless mob boss (played by Sean Penn) going up against an elite anti-mob enforcement squad (led by Josh Brolin) in Los Angeles, opens on January 11, 2013.

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Train filled with hazardous materials derails in NJ

PAULSBORO, NJ — People in three southern New Jersey towns were told Friday to stay inside after a freight train derailed and several tanker cars carrying hazardous materials toppled from a bridge and into a creek.

Emergency management officials issued the advisory to residents of Paulsboro, West Deptford and East Greenwich Township as a precaution.

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At least one tanker car may contain vinyl chloride, Gloucester County Emergency Management director J. Thomas Butts told WPVI-TV.

TV helicopter footage showed at least two tankers in Mantua Creek and one hanging over a trestle, part of which is seemingly collapsed. The creek empties into the Delaware River just across from Philadelphia International Airport.

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A derailed trained in Paulsboro, New Jersey.

The Environmental Protection Agency said short-term exposure to high levels of vinyl chloride can cause dizziness and drowsiness.

A spokesman for the state Environmental Protection Department says officials are trying to determine what the cars were carrying.

The Gloucester County Times says 18 people are reported to be having difficulty breathing.

It's not clear what caused the derailment.

Calls to Conrail have not been returned.

Philadelphia News, Weather and Sports from WTXF FOX 29

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California Pizza Kitchen brings prototype to Sawgrass Mills

The restaurant chain that took barbecued chicken pizza mainstream is ready to push the culinary envelope again. How about a pizza topped with roasted Brussels sprouts and applewood smoked bacon or a Korean barbecue pizza with pork loin and spicy kimchee salad?

Innovative menu items are just one piece of what’s unique about California Pizza Kitchen’s new flagship restaurant unveiled Thursday at Sawgrass Mills in Sunrise. The first of its kind, the Sawgrass location aims to reinvigorate the brand that started in 1985 in Beverly Hills.

“The whole idea is about taking the best of what put us on the map and making it relevant for 2012 and beyond,” said G.J. Hart, who took over as chief executive officer of the chain just over a year ago. “Over the years the brand morphed from being a leader and it became a follower of food trends. We want to bring back the hip, cool feel.”

The changes are obvious from the moment you walk into the restaurant, which opens to the public Monday. The new look is all about focusing on the chain’s California roots. Very little of the bright yellow and chrome remains. The design is California-casual with earth tones and reclaimed wood everywhere from the walls to the floor and tables. An outdoor terrace with couches and fire pits is designed to encourage lingering. Large windows and glass doors let in lots of natural light and fold open to enjoy the weather.

Pizza is center stage with the kitchen designed so diners can watch the pizza makers at work. At the Sawgrass location — and by mid-2013 at all restaurants — pizzas will once again by hand-tossed. Currently the chain uses a pizza press to make the dough more uniform.

The new focus is on upping the culinary quotient across the board with dishes like a roasted beets and whipped goat cheese salad, plus a sweet pea carbonara featuring pea-filled pasta purses tossed with Italian pancetta and a Romano cream sauce. These are some of the unique items only on the Sawgrass menu, which also features a specialty menu of hand-crafted cocktails.

Chain-wide the company has actually slimmed the menu from more than 100 items to 74 in order to improve execution. But there are also more healthy choices like quinoa and arugula salad or a fire-roasted chile relleno stuffed with chicken, cheese, mushrooms, spinach and eggplant that dishes up at only 380 calories.

“As we grew, we didn’t keep up with the creativity on the menu and we tried to be all things to all people,” said Brian Sullivan, senior vice president of culinary innovation, who has been with the company for 24 years. “We’re always going to be pizza-centric. But we’ll continue to push the envelope with these specialty items that resonate with who we are. We don’t want items that you are going to see in other restaurants.”

The chain chose Sawgrass to unveil its new flagship location because of a combination of the area’s diverse demographic base and the influx of international visitors. South Florida has already been a strong market for the brand, which has seven locations in the tri-county area stretching from Coral Gables to Palm Beach Gardens.

The opening is the culmination of a new vision that began to take shape when Golden Gate Capital purchased California Pizza Kitchen in July 2011 for $470 million, taking the company private and bringing in Hart as the new chief executive.

“They saw a brand that was undervalued,” said Hart, who has an ownership stake in the chain. “This is an iconic brand with so much brand equity. If we can bring the excitement and enthusiasm back we’re only going to see it go up.”

Industry experts say the changes make sense because the brand still has a loyal following, although it has not kept pace with the competition.

“It’s a good time for them to go back to what were the fundamental things that made the brand so intriguing,” said Dennis Lombardi of WD Partners, a restaurant industry consultant. “The difficulty is going to be getting the word out to consumers that this is different. The devil is always in the details in these kind of evolutions.”

Based on consumer reaction, the plan is to take pieces of the Sunrise concept and introduce it into the chain’s other 268 existing restaurants. Some restaurants could be completely remodeled, but most will only get elements of the new prototype, which cost $2 million in Sunrise, Hart said. The company’s Fort Lauderdale and Boca Raton locations could be strong candidates for remodeling next year or early 2014, he said.

Community and business leaders, who got a first look at the restaurant on Thursday, were impressed.

“This is phenomenal,” said Luanne Lenberg, general manager of Sawgrass Mills. “We’re so excited to have this caliber of restaurant and to be their test for the rest of the world.”

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Keys stabbing suspect surrenders in Miami-Dade

A 33-year-old Islamorada man wanted in connection with a stabbing earlier this week has surrendered to law enforcement authorities in Miami-Dade.

Alexander Flores told police he stabbed his ex-girlfriend after breaking into her Plantation Key house.

She was airlifted to the Ryder Trauma Center in Miami on Tuesday. Her condition is listed as stable.

Monroe County Sheriff’s detectives drove to Miami Wednesday and picked up Flores, who was charged with aggravated battery, burglary, criminal mischief and resisting arrest. He was booked into the Monroe County jail.

The arrest report says Flores entered the victim’s bedroom and stabbed her in the chest. Flores reportedly told police he became angry when he learned his ex was seeing someone else. He also told police he got drunk, broke into her house and attacked the victim.

The 33-year-old Plantation Key woman told police that Flores held the knife to her throat after the stabbing and forced her to leave the house with him. As they walked out the door, a friend of the victim was outside and Flores ran northbound on the old highway.

The friend then drove the victim to Mariner’s Hospital, where she was later airlifted for treatment in Miami.

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Lohan Attends Bieber Show Pre-Arrest

Prior to hitting the club and getting arrested, Lindsay Lohan started out having a pretty wholesome night on Wednesday at New York City's Madison Square Garden.

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The Liz & Dick actress, 26, attended Justin Bieber's show with opening acts The Wanted and Carly Rae Jepsen.

Lohan has praised Bieber in the past, even comparing their mothers. She tweeted on Sept. 28, writing: "I think @justinbieber's mom Pattie Mallette & my mom @dinalohan are so strong for speaking out about their stories. It's women like this... who make a difference in the world.. They encourage us to be strong. Thank you to @dinalohan & pattie mallette for being such strong women."

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From the looks of a photo taken by Twitter user HarpoK21 on Wednesday night, the actress had pretty good seats for the show, perhaps even V.I.P.

Hours later at 4 a.m. on Thursday morning, Lohan was arrested after allegedly punching a woman at Club Avenue. She has since been released and is facing third degree assault charges.

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Superstorm Sandy victims to receive aid and higher taxes

Superstorm Sandy may have one more nasty surprise still to come: higher taxes.

The math is simple and cruel. The storm left fewer properties standing, often wrecking waterfront communities that paid the highest taxes because of the desirability of living near the water.

Unless shore towns from Rhode Island to New Jersey get a big influx of aid from the state and federal governments, which are themselves strapped for cash, they will have no choice but to raise taxes on homes and businesses that survived to make up for the loss. Even with federal reimbursement of 75 percent, the towns — many of which were already struggling before the storm — could still be on the hook for tens of millions of dollars.

AP Photo/Julio Cortez

Communities like Seaside Heights, New Jersey face higher taxes as a result of their destruction during Superstorm Sandy.

"Hopefully taxes won't go up; we all have individual bills that we're going to have to worry about," said Ralph Isaacs, a 71-year-old retired teacher whose home in Long Beach, N.Y., was flooded with 18 inches of water, knocking out the electricity and heat and forcing him and his wife into a rented recreational vehicle for 17 days. "We're pretty sure the insurance money is not going to cover everything."

Toms River, where 5,000 residents are still out of their homes, recently passed a $35 million emergency appropriation; debris removal alone is costing it $1 million a week. The township's Ortley Beach section, where property values and taxes were highest, saw 225 homes destroyed. Administrator Paul Shives asked state officials this week for three to five years of extra state aid.

Right now, he said, it is impossible for towns like his to even consider formulating a budget without knowing how much tax money will be coming in. Shore towns especially are expecting a wave of tax appeals from storm-damaged or destroyed homes that will lower the towns' tax bases, though that doesn't appear to have begun in earnest yet.

The realities have touched off an intense push to get the federal government to assume the largest share of the cost. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo this week upped his state's reimbursement request from $30 billion to $42 billion; New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie asked Wednesday for $36.8 billion.

Cuomo said most of the recovery should be paid for by the federal government.

"To try to finance (recovery costs) through taxes would incapacitate this state," said Cuomo, who noted the cost of repairing just one subway station in lower Manhattan will be $600 million.

Christie — who this week announced his campaign for a second term amid high poll ratings for his handling of the storm and who is considered a leading potential Republican presidential candidate in 2016 — has told residents in storm-damaged areas to expect to pay higher taxes. This month, he told communities they can exempt storm recovery costs from a state-imposed 2 percent limit on property tax increases.

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City National Bank of Florida and its Spanish parent have four years to evaluate the Miami bank’s future ownership

City National Bank of Florida, the Miami bank purchased by Bankia (formerly Caja Madrid) of Spain in November 2008, said Wednesday that its parent has a “four-year window to evaluate alternatives” for the bank’s future ownership and will work closely with management in Miami during the process.

The Spanish government has reached and agreement with the European Union related to Spain’s financial system problems, which will result in a recapitalization of Bankia and other institutions, the bank said. The agreement calls for Bankia to sell non-core assets and its holdings outside of Spain so that Bankia will emerge with a solid capital position and be more focused on its core domestic business.

“Because City National Bank is so well capitalized, profitable and well positioned in the marketplace, we are going to take our time to fully evaluate all of our strategic alternatives,” City National Bank President and CEO Jorge Gonzalez said in a statement. “This does not impact our ongoing strategy of profitable growth and diversification or our commitment to the markets we serve. Our focus continues to be taking excellent care of our clients and employees. ”

City National, founded 65 years ago, has $4.32 billion in assets and 26 branches from Miami-Dade County to the greater Orlando area.

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Man shot and killed in police-involved shooting identified

The man shot and killed by police Tuesday afternoon in a West Miami-Dade apartment complex has been identified as Alexis Suarez Reyes, Miami-Dade police said Wednesday.

Reyes, 47, lived at the apartment complex at 1907 SW 107th Ave. Miami-Dade police detectives had gone to the complex to follow up on an investigation of a case from Miami International Airport when they encountered Reyes in the apartment.

According to a news release issued Wednesday, Reyes was armed when police confronted him. He was shot multiple times and subsequently transported to the Trauma Center at Kendall Regional Medical Center, where he died.

Reyes is the second person to be shot and killed by Miami-Dade police in the past week. It is unclear why police were investigating Reyes, and the circumstances that led to his shooting are under investigation.

Police said they found a ballistics vest in Reyes’s possession, though it is unclear if he was wearing it at the time of the shooting.

John Rivera, president of the Miami-Dade chapter of the Police Benevolent Association, said two police officers were involved in the shooting.

“They’ll take a couple of days off administratively,’’ he said. “When you shoot somebody, regardless of whether you kill them or not, it’s always a very traumatic situation.’’

Rivera, an advocate for the police, said he spoke with the two officers shortly after the shooting. Though he declined to divulge their conversation, Rivera said that he believes “the evidence” will prove their actions were justified.

“It was a clean shoot,’’ he said.

WPLG-ABC 10 reported that Reyes’s family said he was a security guard at Miami International Airport. Miami-Dade police said late Tuesday they also had received that information and were trying to determine whether it was true.

It was the second police-involved shooting this week. On Sunday, one man was killed and a second was hurt at Flea Market USA, 3015 NW 79th St.

In that shooting, Miami-Dade police believed the men may have been connected to a home invasion robbery earlier in the day.

When officers approached the van the men were in, police said the driver hit the gas and rammed a police vehicle. Officers fired, and the van tried to get away, hitting other parked cars before it came to a stop, police said.

Miami Herald staff writer Diana Moskovitz contributed to this report.

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Gabby Douglas on 'The Vampire Diaries'

As if the thrill and pride of winning two gold medals at the London Olympics weren't enough, Entertainment Tonight invited Gabby Douglas to the set of her favorite show, The Vampire Diaries, where she got to meet the cast and even made a cameo.

While the 16-year-old gymnast was star-struck to meet the cast of her favorite show in person, the cast revealed that they were just as star-struck to meet her, an Olympic gold medalist, after watching her and the USA women's gymnastics team make their name in history in London this past summer as the Fierce Five.

VIDEO: Gabby Douglas Surprised by 'Vampire Diaries' Cast

"It was really cool," said Nina Dobrev ("Elena Gilbert"), who competed in rhythmic gymnastics when she was younger. "We're such a big family and everyone [on the show] was invested in her story and in her success, and...everyone was just really excited to meet her."

Ian Somerhalder ("Damon Salvatore"), whom Douglas revealed to be her favorite actor on the show, echoed Dobrev's excitement to have the Olympian on the set and also expressed his pride in her accomplishments.

VIDEO: Exclusive: Gabby Douglas 'Shakes Up' Dance Floor

"It really is incredible to have her here," he said. "She's done extraordinary work out in the world, and what's she's accomplished is just incredible and we're all extremely proud of her. She brought home the gold for the USA, and it's pretty incredible to have her here."

Just as Gabby keeps up on all the Vampire Diaries episodes, the cast revealed that they were glued to the television during the Olympic gymnastic events this summer. Candice Accola ("Caroline Forbes") said that the suspense from watching the events brought out a nervous habit.

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"I watched the women's gymnastics and I watched her take [the] all-around and the team [gold medals]... I was on the edge of my couch. I bit all of my fingernails off," Accola said. "I only bite my fingernails during scary movies--and apparently, the Olympics. So, [there's a] fun fact."

Gabby Douglas' cameo on The Vampire Diaries airs tomorrow (Nov. 29) at 8 p.m. on the CW.

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