Free Republic

Rejoice — Martha Beatriz Roque, an economist and one of Cuba's most famous dissidents, is free (as much as you can be free in Cuba). She was released from prison last week, having been arrested in Castro's March 2003 crackdown. As she walked out of prison, she said to a Lieutenant Colonel Perdomo, "I am leaving free of conditions. I am a dissident and I will continue being a dissident." According to the Information Bridge, "Martha Beatriz requested that we extend her gratitude to everyone in the exile community and in the entire world who provided solidarity in her case,...

...FANEUIL, 26, HAS improbably emerged as a key figure in the Justice Department investigation of Martha Stewart’s sale of stock in the biotech company ImClone last December. Law-enforcement officials have confirmed to NEWSWEEK that Faneuil has agreed to plead guilty to a minor charge and to cooperate in the case that has shocked all Americans with the realization of how much they enjoy seeing Martha Stewart in trouble. People get the informers they deserve; Leona Helmsley was sent up the river by a maid who recalled her sneering that “only the little people pay taxes.” If Faneuil’s testimony seals Stewart’s...

Martha Stewart's embattled stockbroker Peter Bacanovic has been spending his days out of sight, chatting with friends on the phone, writing thank-you notes to well-wishers and huddling with lawyers, a new report says. Bacanovic, currently holed up at a friend's house as the ImClone scandal continues to brew, has also been fielding phone calls from friends and questioning why he ever hired Douglas Faneuil as his assistant, New York magazine reports this week. Bacanovic client Stewart unloaded 3,928 shares of ImClone stock on Dec. 27, a day before the Food and Drug Administration nixed a key application for Erbitux, the...