Free Republic

A one-legged man known by the alias “Ponce de Leon” was arrested with a gun after violating an injunction and getting into an altercation over a dog. Mario Arteaga, 62, who lives in the Harbor Hills community in Lady Lake, was arrested Monday evening by Lake County sheriff’s deputies after violating an injunction obtained by his neighbor. Arteaga was taken into custody at Marion County Road and Saddle Ridge Lane in Weirsdale, not far from Harbor Hills. Arteaga and a friend had been “antagonizing” a dog, 51-year-old John Michael Keenan, also of Harbor Hills, told deputies. Keenan asked Arteaga to...

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Unknown people toppled a statue of Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León in the pre-dawn hours of Monday ahead of a visit of King Felipe VI to the U.S. Caribbean territory of Puerto Rico. Col. José Juan García, police commissioner for San Juan, told The Associated Press that officers patrolling the cobblestone streets of the capital’s historic district heard a loud bang at 4:30 a.m. and found the statue broken in pieces. “It sounded like an explosion,” he said. The statue was made of melted steel from British cannons and featured the Spanish explorer...

The Spanish firm Grifols helped set off a kerfuffle last year when it, along with other firms, offered nearly double the going price for blood donations for a COVID-19 treatment trial. Brigham Young University in Idaho had to threaten some enterprising students with suspension to keep them from intentionally trying to contract COVID-19. The trial failed, however, and now the Barcelona-based firm is hoping to extract something far more valuable from the plasma of young volunteers: a set of microscopic molecules that could reverse the process of aging itself. Earlier this year, Grifols closed on a $146 million-deal to buy...

The real story goes something like this: In 1511, messy political squabbling forced Ponce to surrender the governorship of Puerto Rico, an appointment he had held since 1509. As a consolation prize, King Ferdinand offered him Bimini, assuming the stalwart conquistador could finance an expedition and actually find it. J. Michael Francis, a historian at the University of South Florida, St. Petersburg who has spent decades studying the Spanish colonies in the Americas , says no mention of a Fountain of Youth occurs in any known documents from Ponce’s lifetime, including contracts and other official correspondence with the Crown. In...

Florida Capital: TallahasseeState abbreviation/Postal code: Fla./FLGovernor: Jeb Bush, R (to Jan. 2007)Lieut. Governor: Toni Jennings, R (to Jan. 2007)Senators: Mel Martinez, R (to Jan. 2011); Bill Nelson, D (to Jan. 2007)U.S. Representatives: 25Historical biographies of Congressional membersSecy. of State: Glenda Hood, R (to Jan. 2007)Atty. General: Charlie Crist, R (to Jan. 2007)Chief Financial Officer: Tom Gallagher, R (to Jan. 2007)Organized as territory: March 30, 1821Entered Union (rank): March 3, 1845 (27)Present constitution adopted: 1969Motto: In God we trust (1868)State symbols: flower orange blossom (1909) bird mockingbird (1927) song “Suwannee River” (1935) Nickname: Sunshine State (1970)Origin of name: From the...

An attorney for a Ponce de Leon Middle School student has filed notice to sue the girl's math teacher and Miami-Dade County Public Schools because the girl says her teacher refused to let her use the bathroom and forced her to have a bowel movement in class.The suit seeks unspecificed damages for humiliation that seventh-grader Sophia Gutierrez said she suffered, Coral Gables attorney Jason Setchen said.Sophia, 14, says she had a stomach ache April 24, but her teacher, Edwin Victor-Louis, did not give her a bathroom pass. Sophia says she asked several times and told Victor-Louis it was an emergency.Sophia...