The San Juan Daily Star, the only paper with News Service in English in Puerto Rico, publishes 7 days a week, with a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday edition, along with a Weekend Edition to cover Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
The Social Welfare Committee in the island House of Representatives on Thursday discussed House Bill 764, which seeks to limit the participation of trans athletes in sports, with the Puerto Rico Olympic Committee (COPUR by its Spanish acronym) expressing its opposition to the measure.
COPUR President Sara Rosario said the transgender population in sports is not significantly large.
“Of this population, those who come to the sport are a small part. At the Tokyo Olympics, only four out of 6,700 athletes were transgender, representing 0.0006 percent,” Rosario said in a written statement.
Rosario argued that the ban would go against the inclusion of a sector of the population.
“The way in which this bill is presented would leave out the participation of a possible minority population that should not be discriminated against and deserves to have participation in sport,” she said.
“We will continue working to protect women’s spaces and rights,” said Rep. Lisie Burgos Muñiz, who chairs the committee.
During the hearing, various representatives of the sports and education sector presented their arguments.
Recreation and Sports Secretary Ray Quiñones Vázquez advocated for the approval of the measure, as long as international sports rules are not altered.
“We have no objection to the approval of this bill subject to it not altering the general and technical sports rules formulated by the sports regulatory bodies at the international
level,” Quiñones Vázquez emphasized.
“There is no doubt that the differences between men and women involved in sports activities influence the level of sports performance,” he added. “The natural physical and biological differences between men and women are the basis for the division of most sports disciplines. This distinction has allowed both sexes to face opponents in similar conditions, which provides the opportunity to compete equally and fairly.”
Félix Angel Pérez Rivera of the Department of Education also endorsed the legislation.
“This issue is one which, despite being novel, has provoked passionate discussions from people who support one measure or the other,” he noted. “Even transgender people and former Olympic medalists have spoken out in favor of maintaining the categories by which most sports are governed.”
“To the extent that the [Education] Department has already established and maintained the age and sex categories in sporting events and school competitions, we have no objection to the approval of the measure,” Pérez Rivera said.
Senate President José Luis Dalmau Santiago said Thursday he expects Senate Bill 0778, which addresses the problem of homelessness in Puerto Rico, to pass in the House of Representatives and eventually become law.
“It is essential that as a country we understand the complexity of the situation of homeless people and address the root of the problem,” Dalmau Santiago said.
“My call is that this bill be addressed as soon as possible so that all sectors and government agencies can join their efforts to combat homelessness on the island,” he added
The bill, an initiative of Sen. José Vargas Vidot, aims to establish the “Plan to Address the Homelessness
Phenomenon in Puerto Rico” and creates the Office of Support for the Homeless Population.
According to recent data from the Continuous Care System (COC by its Spanish initials) PR-502, the northern part of the island has seen an increase of 51 cases of homelessness compared to 2022, reaching a total of 1,077 people without a permanent roof. Of that number, 52.6% are facing homelessness for the first time.
In addition, COC PR-502 reported an increase in the number of women living on the street, from 24% to 26.4% of the total homeless population.
“The situation of homeless people in Puerto Rico is cause for immediate attention,” Dalmau Santiago said. “We cannot allow our fellow citizens to live in these precarious conditions.”
House Education Committee Chairwoman Deborah Soto Arroyo expressed frustration on Thursday that the Education Department only this month sent classroom supplies that had been requisitioned since October to island schools.
Soto Arroyo said the department once again failed children and young people in the public education system after the unjustified delay in delivering school materials.
“Today I want to state that this House of Representatives repudiates with all its might the gross negligence of the Department of Education and its neverending bureaucratic processes that continue to punish our students and the country’s teaching class,” the lawmaker said. “Unfortunately, on this occasion, once again our schools lack the basic materials to carry out the teaching and learning process at a time when the department has a historically large budget for these purposes.”
“The department has the ministerial
duty to do everything in its power to comply with the requirements that the agency itself lays out for school directors in relation to the dates that it establishes for each director to make the corresponding requests before the end of the current fiscal year,” Soto Arroyo continued. “However, for some reason, this has not happened. Instead, the Department of Education sends a communication to the school directors indicating that they have until today, May 31, 2023, to carry out the required requisitions in their schools. Otherwise, they need access to funds from the Design for School Excellence (DEE by its Spanish initials) Program. Each campus accesses these funds after submitting a framework that describes the work to be done during the school year and the efforts to meet institutional goals and each student’s academic achievement.”
One of the factors to consider for allocating this budget item is the school’s enrollment and other indicators of academic achievement. Each school director makes their requests according to the identified
needs. The purchase is deducted from the DEE item upon receipt of the materials, the legislator said.
“However, suppose these materials are not delivered to the schools,” Soto Arroyo said. “In that case, the purchase is not reflected, leaving the money in the pipeline. The money is committed, but the materials do not arrive and the 2023 school year has already ended.”
“Meanwhile, the Department of Education announced that for September 2023 it would start the Socio-Emotional Plan Project in schools, allocating an amount of $250,000 per school for the development of family and community integration activities,” the District 10 (Toa Baja) lawmaker said. “However, we have come to learn that it is only in May 2023 that the budget of each campus was committed to complying with the program. That is, with a delay of one year without knowing when it will begin. Similarly, all funds allocated to schools for professional development for teachers were lost after the end of the school year -- an estimated amount
of $25,000 to $30,000 per school.”
“We are demanding that the secretary of Education, Eliezer Ramos, identify why the materials have not reached the schools even though some schools had made the requisitions when the Excellence Design Plan was approved,” Soto Arroyo said. “There must be some consequence. This cannot go unnoticed because at the end of the road, it is our students and teachers who are hurt.”
The Puerto Rico Teachers Association (AMPR by its Spanish initials), which exclusively represents the island’s public school teachers, on Thursday demanded participation in the executive committee in charge of designing public policy for the decentralization of the Department of Education (DE), as established in Executive Order 2023-014, signed by Gov.
Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia.AMPR President Víctor Manuel Bonilla Sánchez said in a letter that although they support the decentralization of the DE, there is concern about the absence of participation of teachers in the composition of the executive committee.
“We are the organization that has firsthand knowledge of the needs of our school communities: teachers, students, employees and family members,” Bonilla Sánchez said in
the letter.
AMPR Local Union General Secretary Ángel Javier Pérez Hernández emphasized that the inclusion of the AMPR in the committee is crucial to “guarantee the transparency and credibility of this governmental process.” However, AMPR Vice President Raúl González warned that decentralization could open the door to privatizing schools by allowing alliance schools to become local education agencies, or LEAs.
Speaker of the House of Representatives
Rafael “Tatito” Hernández Montañez
introduced a measure Thursday to allow municipalities to create a “Municipal Emergency, Fire and Rescue Management Unit” to act as a unified and self-sufficient entity to improve emergency response.
“It is essential to decentralize the current emergency management system, which is in a single structure at the state level and that does not respond quickly enough,” Hernández Montañez said in a written statement. “This measure will give adequate resources to the
municipalities, which are the entities closest to citizens.”
The new municipal entity would have the legal capacity to sign agreements with the 9-1-1 Emergency System and the State Bureau of Emergency Management and Disaster Administration to provide services in a given region. In addition, it would have preference to contractually agree on emergency medical services.
“The intention is to strengthen the synergy between the State Bureau of Emergency Management and Disaster Administration and the municipal emergency management offices,” the House speaker said. “The goal is
for aid to arrive immediately without bureaucracy or unnecessary delays.”
In addition, the measure would authorize municipalities to establish agreements with the central government to operate the fire departments in their respective towns, and would give them the responsibility of providing first aid services and pre-hospital medical care.
“As in the best and most modern cities in North America and Europe, with this initiative we integrate all the services already offered by municipalities and the state for the management of various emergencies in a more agile, capable and competent structure,” Hernández Montañez said.
Gov. Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia insisted on Thursday that Puerto Rico is in an improved position to face the Atlantic hurricane season, which had just begun.
“Are we better off than we were before [Hurricane] Fiona? Definitely yes, we are in better condition, we have better preparation than before Fiona. We’re better off than we were before Maria, obviously much better than we were before Maria,” the governor said at a press conference. “So well, you have better resources, for example, that the electrical system is in better condition, that the disengagement has been done, in areas where in the past it had not been done. That we have more equipment available to replace any [damaged] equipment. That today, I find out that we have more generators, that we have more shelters in proper condition. Given all that, under all the metrics, we are in better condition than we were last year before Fiona, and not to mention Maria.”
The island Bureau of Emergency Management and Disaster Administration (NMEAD by its Spanish acronym) urged citizens to prepare for the hurricane season, which officially began Thursday and ends on Nov. 30.
“We are prepared to react and help in any emergency,” stated NMEAD Commissioner Nino Correa Filomeno. “But it is important that each person, family, community and municipalities have their necessary provisions and resources.”
The preparation includes training for mayors, zone directors and municipal emergency management offices in collaboration with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). A seminar on emergency management is expected on June 12 and June 13.
The FEMA coordinator in Puerto Rico, Orlando Olivera, stressed the importance of preparing all sectors of the community, especially the most vulnerable populations.
For this season, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecasts between 12 and 17 named storms, 5-9 hurricanes, and 1-4 major hurricanes.
“Puerto Ricans must have already made the decision to be prepared,” warned Ernesto Morales, alert coordinator of the National Meteorological Service.
NMEAD, along with relevant agencies, remains active in emergency preparedness and response. Work has also been done on training for first responders and the general public through the Community Emergency Response Team program, and around 100 “community hubs,” or community centers, have been established throughout the island.
“The DSP [Public Safety Department] and all its bureaus are active to work together to address any emergency situation,” DSP Secretary Alexis Torres said.
In the event of an emergency, the Emergency Operations Center is activated, which coordinates requests from mayors, shelters, other agencies and the public itself.
In Caguas on Thursday, Mayor William Miranda Torres urged citizens to prepare for the 2023 hurricane season.
“Regardless of whether or not we experience the direct impact of an atmospheric event, we must prepare,” the mayor
said. “The hurricane season is a period that generates a lot of anxiety, so citizens should stay informed by following official sources. It is important for each family to review and activate their emergency plan. For this season we launch our campaign ‘Caguas Activate’ to guide citizens during the hurricane season.”
Caguas Activate is available on the www.caguas.gov.pr portal, and on the Facebook and Twitter pages of the Autonomous Municipality of Caguas.
Miranda Torres noted that the Caguas Municipal Office of Emergency Management has prepared, as it does every year, according to its emergency plan, a process that includes conducting mitigation work and inspecting areas that are susceptible to flooding or landslides, as well as ditches and sewers, to certify that they are not covered or clogged.
In an emergency officials recommend having supplies for at least 10 days: water (one gallon per day per person), non-perishable food, flashlight, radio, batteries, first aid kit, medicines, multipurpose tools, manual can opener, hygiene items, copies of important documents, cash in small denominations, cell phone with its charger, family and emergency contact information, emergency blanket, a map of the area and a whistle.
Pets should not be left alone at home, but rather should be taken with a family member, along with their food, medicines, a collar with their identification, and their vaccination documents.
The Caguas mayor also called on citizens to maintain a proactive attitude and contribute to the preparation effort by collecting debris at home that may become projectiles or affect the course of runoff, streams, rivers and other bodies of water. It is necessary that yard waste be separated for later disposal.
The official refuges in Caguas are: Abelardo Díaz Morales School in Santa Gertrudis Street, Urb. Santa Elvira; Inés María Mendoza School in 10 Urb. Villas de Castro; Cipriano Man-
rique School on highway PR-765, km 3.1, in Bo. Borinquen; Francisco Valdés Rola School on PR-798, km 12.5, Bo. Río Cañas; and Dr. Juan J. Osuna School on Calle 1. FEMA, meanwhile, announced Thursday that it had located over $1 million in mitigation measures for generator projects that will help address future disasters in several facilities in Bayamón and Guaynabo.
The funds under the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP) will provide essential services to communities during power outages or future natural disasters. To date, the agency has awarded nearly $415.3 million under HMGP for the installation of generators in multiple projects.
“Guaranteeing power during an emergency is critical for communities,” said Federal Disaster Recovery Coordinator José G. Baquero. “This is one of the measures that FEMA is working on to strengthen the preparedness of government agencies and nonprofit organizations that will serve Puerto Rico during a future response.”
Following a surge of COVID-19 cases, Health Secretary Carlos Mellado López urged citizens on Thursday to maintain preventive actions and to get vaccinated to prevent the spread of the illness.
“COVID-19 persists, and we cannot lower our guard,” Mellado López said. “We have recently seen a trend of increasing cases. Therefore, isolation measures are essential to minimize the transmission of the virus. People with a positive result must be in isolation for five days. Those who do not have a fever on the 5th day can return to their tasks using masks until the 10th day after their positive result.”
He noted that testing negative for COVID-19 is not necessary to return to work.
The physician urged citizens to “keep
their vaccination updated with the bivalent vaccine.”
“The vaccine reduces the possibility of infection and helps stop the spread of the virus,” the Health chief said. “However, prevention measures remain just as important.”
The Department of Health, meanwhile, operates an antiviral evaluation and treatment center at Ramón Ruíz Arnau University Hospital (HURRA) in Bayamón. Likewise, there are treatment centers around the island. The directory is available at: https://www.salud. gov.pr/CMS/DOWNLOAD/7028.
The centers for early detection remain open in most municipalities, Mellado López said. Every week, more than 90 events with certified antigen tests are carried out, in addition to the detection center in front of the Department of Health, where molecular tests
are conducted.
The Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) recently updated the population group to which the administration of the bivalent vaccine corresponds. Anyone over six who has not received a dose of COVID-19 is eligible to receive a single dose of the bivalent vaccine. Whereas any person over six years of age who has received any of the previous vaccinations or has completed their vaccination schedule is eligible to receive the updated dose of the bivalent vaccine.
Immunocompromised patients who have received an updated COVID-19 vaccine may receive a single additional dose at least two months after an updated COVID-19 vaccine. Extra doses may be administered at the health care provider’s discretion and at intervals determined by the provider. Simi-
larly, pregnant or lactating women should get vaccinated with the bivalent dose.
The Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority’s (PREPA) unsecured creditors (UCC) have asked U.S. District Court Judge Laura Taylor Swain to allow their experts to testify at a hearing next week that will seek to determine the size of the bonded debt claims in the public utility’s bankruptcy case.
Swain’s initial procedures order was unclear as to whether she sought declarations from the unsecured creditors’ witnesses, or
only those of the Financial Oversight and Management Board and bondholders to be filed ahead of Tuesday’s hearing, the UCC said.
The UCC’s witnesses, Julia Frayer of London Economics International and Scott Martínez of Alix Partners, also were not given time for cross-examination or redirect as bondholders and the oversight board witnesses were, the motion said.
The group argued that its witnesses had the right to be heard at the hearing.
Swain ruled on March 22 that the claim
amount on bondholders’ outstanding debt be estimated, when she found that the bonds were backed only by a small amount held in a few specific accounts.
Bondholders estimate their claims as the $8.3 billion face value of their debt, while the oversight board has put the amount at no more than $2 billion, and the UCC estimated even less.
Meanwhile, the Center for Investigative Journalism (CPI by its Spanish initials) reported Thursday that for the 2022-2023 fiscal year, the University of Puerto Rico identified $34.5
million for the cost of electricity at its 11 campuses, equivalent to 3% of the institution’s certified budget. However, as the fiscal year is about to close, the estimated total expense for that service increased to $44.1 million, a difference of about $10 million more in expenses. Some campuses, such as Río Piedras and Cayey, experienced even more expenses related to electricity service due to prolonged breakdowns or unexpected needed repairs at electrical substations, according to the CPI report.
By THE STAR STAFF
The Special Independent Prosecutor Panel (PFEI by its Spanish initials) shelved the case against Ángel Pérez Otero, the former mayor of Guaynabo, involving a contract for a dog park, coinciding with the recommendation of Justice Secretary Domingo Emanuelli Hernández, the PFEI announced on Thursday.
“We reviewed the evidence submitted and agreed with the recommendation of the Secretary of Justice,” the PFEI said.
The case began with a petition from Guaynabo Mayor Edward O’Neill Rosa, who
requested an investigation into the possible illegal actions of former mayor Pérez Otero in a collaborative agreement with the private entity I Love Dogs.
The agreement involved the disbursement of public funds for the construction and development of a dog park on the corporation’s land, without, supposedly, yielding benefits for the municipality or citizens.
The Justice Department’s Division of Public Integrity and Comptroller Affairs (DIPAC by its Spanish acronym) conducted the preliminary investigation. In its report, DIPAC concluded that insufficient evidence existed to establish cause to believe that
the former mayor had engaged in criminal conduct.
“The contract was made following all applicable regulations and had the authorization of the Municipal Legislature of Guaynabo,” DIPAC said. “We found no evidence of violation of Puerto Rico’s criminal laws or government ethics.”
The report also clarified that Pérez Otero as mayor had the legal authority to contract with natural and legal persons in addition to obtaining authorization from the municipal assembly.
In addition, DIPAC determined that there was no evidence that Pérez Otero used his position or public funds to obtain unauthorized benefits for himself or I Love Dogs.
The bipartisan bill to suspend the federal debt limit and impose spending caps encountered a new set of obstacles in the Senate on Thursday as a group of Republican defense hawks raised objections to Pentagon funding levels they said were too low, threatening to delay passage of a plan that must be enacted by Monday to avoid a government default.
Despite warnings from leaders of both parties that the Senate needed to act swiftly, a handful of Republicans took to the floor to assail the military spending in the measure negotiated between Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden and demand that their concerns be addressed before it could be passed.
“To my House colleagues, I can’t believe you did this,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., accusing the architects of the measure of undercutting the military at a time of rising threats from Russia and China. “This budget is a win for China.”
The concerns threw the timetable for Senate action into flux, with some lawmakers saying a vote could come Thursday evening but officials cautioning approval might not come until Friday at the earliest.
The agreement, which was approved overwhelmingly by the House on Wednesday night, would increase Pentagon spending to $388 billion for next year, a 3% raise, when many domestic programs were targeted for cuts in the plan. But GOP backers of higher spending for the military argued the package fell far short of what was needed.
“I just have to say that the fact that this is being called a victory by some people on our side of the aisle is absolutely inaccurate,” said Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., who called the funding level “woefully inadequate.”
Graham and others said that at a minimum, they wanted a commitment that Congress would later move on a supplemental funding bill to beef up the spending, although this would in effect reduce the savings Republicans had hoped to achieve through their debt limit leverage.
“We know that this budget is not adequate to the global threats that we face,” said Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the senior Republican on the full Appropriations Committee. “An emergency supplemental must be coming our way.”
The opposition erupted almost immediately after Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., the majority leader, warned that the Senate needed to move quickly and make no changes to the agreement to clear it for Biden’s signature by Monday. He admonished lawmakers not to engage in brinkmanship before the so-called X-date of June 5, when Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said the government will run out of cash to pay its bills.
“Time is a luxury the Senate does not have if we want to prevent default,” Schumer said. “June 5 is less than four days away. At this point, any needless delay or any last-minute holdups would be an unnecessary and even dangerous risk.”
Even as the deal migrated across the Capitol, the effects of the debt limit continued to pinch. The Treasury announced Thursday that it would delay auctions of three-month and six-
month “bills” — short-term debt that the government no longer has room to take on until the borrowing cap is suspended.
Multiple senators have said they want to propose amendments to the bill, which would suspend the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling until January 2025 while cutting spending on domestic programs. They have the ability to slow the measure procedurally if they are denied the opportunity.
Senators were negotiating which amendments would be allowed on the floor, but Schumer was determined to defeat them. Any changes would force the measure back to the House, where no action would be likely to occur before the default deadline.
“Any change to this bill that forces us to send it back to the House would be entirely unacceptable,” he said. “It would almost guarantee default.”
Among those seeking votes is Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., who Thursday called for stripping a provision from the legislation that would expedite the approval of an oil pipeline in West Virginia.
“I support improving the permitting process for all energy projects,” Kaine said. “But Congress putting its thumb on the scale so that one specific project doesn’t have to comply with the same process as everyone else is the definition of unfair and opens the door to corruption.”
After driving much of the legislative agenda the previous two years, the Senate left negotiating on the debt limit to Biden and McCarthy, whose demand for spending cuts and other policy changes brought the country to the brink of default. Nearly all Republican senators signed a letter backing McCarthy in the effort. As a result, senators had little influence over the negotiations and are now being forced to approve legislation they did not help shape. It is leaving some frustrated.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, praised McCarthy’s efforts but said senators had no obligation to simply rubber-stamp the deal and deserved opportunities to change it.
“We weren’t a party to the agreement,” he said. “Why should we be bound by the strict terms of that agreement? The Senate has not had a say in the process so far.”
But Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the minority leader, urged his fellow Republicans to back the plan.
“Last night, an overwhelming majority of our House colleagues voted to pass the agreement Speaker McCarthy reached with President Biden,” he said. “In doing so, they took an urgent and important step in the right direction for the health of our economy and the future of our country.”
Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida came to Iowa for his first trip as a presidential candidate and made plain that he was done being Donald Trump’s punching bag.
After absorbing months of attacks from Trump that went mostly unanswered, DeSantis has borrowed one of his rival’s favorite lines — “I’m going to counterpunch” — and jabbed back.
He called one of the spending bills that Trump signed “grotesque” and accused him of increasing the national debt. He said the way Trump had sided with The Walt Disney Co. in DeSantis’ war with the entertainment giant was “bizarre.” He described Trump’s criticism of the governor’s handling of COVID as “ridiculous.” And he dared Trump to take a position on the debt-limit bill pending in Washington.
“Are you leading from the front?” DeSantis said, almost teasingly. “Or are you waiting for polls to tell you what position to take?”
A tricky balancing act lies ahead for DeSantis. All of those comments came not onstage in his first campaign speech before hundreds of Republicans at an evangelical church, but during a 15-minute news conference with reporters afterward. He did not mention Trump by name when he spoke directly to voters in each of his first four Iowa stops, although he has drawn implicit contrasts.
The two-pronged approach reflects the remarkable degree to which his pathway to the nomination depends on his ability to win over — and not alienate — the significant bloc of Republican voters who still like Trump even if they are willing to consider an alternative.
“I don’t like to see them battle and do smear campaigns,” said Jay Schelhaas, 55, a professor of nursing who came to see DeSantis on Wednesday in Pella, Iowa. An evangelical voter, he said he was undecided on whom to support in 2024 after backing Trump in his two past presidential runs.
Some themes have emerged in DeSantis’ early broadsides. He has sought to question Trump’s commitment to conservatism (“I do think, unfortunately, he’s decided to move left on some of these issues”); his ability to execute his agenda (“I’ve been listening to these politicians talking about securing the border for years and years and years”);
and his ability to win the 2024 general election (“There are a lot of voters that just aren’t going to ever vote for him”).
It was no coincidence that Trump arrived in Iowa on DeSantis’ heels Wednesday, in a sign of the intensifying political skirmish between the leading Republican presidential contenders and the centrality of Iowa in their paths to the nomination. Trump holds an advantage of roughly 30 percentage points in early national polls of the Republican primary.
In a statement, Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for Trump, said that DeSantis’ first speech was “crafted to appease establishment Never Trumpers who are looking for a swamp puppet that will do their bidding.”
DeSantis is seeking a challenging middle ground as he begins this new, more confrontational phase. He is trying to show voters that he is the kind of fighter who will not back down — even against his party’s dominant figure. At the same time, he must avoid being seen as overly focused on Republican infighting.
“I’m going to focus my fire on Biden,” DeSantis said at his kickoff speech Tuesday night in Clive, a suburb of Des Moines, even as he stepped up his attacks on Trump. “And I think he should do the same.”
Advisers to DeSantis said his more assertive posture stemmed largely from the fact that he is now an actual candidate. But it is a notable shift. At a recent dinner with donors in Tallahassee, Florida, DeSantis was asked when he would start slugging Trump, and he suggested he would not be doing so immediately, according to an attendee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a private conversation.
For the third time in DeSantis’ three trips to Iowa this year, Trump planned to follow close behind with a two-
day swing of his own. In March, when DeSantis came for his book tour, Trump arrived days later in the same city and drew a bigger crowd. In midMay, Trump had scheduled a rally to stomp on the Florida governor’s trip, though he canceled at the last minute, saying it was because of the weather. It was DeSantis who one-upped him then, appearing at a barbecue joint nearby.
“The weather was so nice that we felt we just had to come,” DeSantis said to laughs in Clive.
Trump is doing a local television interview Wednesday, and Thursday he will host a lunch with religious leaders in Des Moines after attending a breakfast with a local Republican group. He is also holding a Fox News town hall event moderated by Sean Hannity.
Trump has been far from subtle in his attacks on DeSantis, calling him “Ron DeSanctimonious,” denouncing his leadership of Florida and lashing him from the left for past proposals to trim Social Security and Medicare spending. No matter how much mud Trump slings, Republican voters have tended not to punish him, a double standard that has long worked to his advantage.
“I guess he’s got to respond in some way,” Tim Hamer, a retired Iowan who worked in banking and owned a lavender farm, said of DeSantis. Hamer, who was at the governor’s event in Council Bluffs on Wednesday, said he had voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020 but was now leaning toward DeSantis
“The point is,” he added, “don’t descend to Trump’s level.”
Among the issues over which DeSantis has explicitly broken with Trump is the legislation the former president signed that allows a pathway for nonviolent offenders to shrink their prison time. Last week, DeSantis called the measure “a jailbreak bill.”
In stop after stop, DeSantis has also pointed to his ability to serve as president for two terms, unlike Trump, saying that the next president could appoint as many as four Supreme Court justices.
He said Tuesday, “I don’t need someone to give me a list to know what a conservative justice looks like.” Trump — whose appointment of the justices who tilted the Supreme Court rightward and overturned Roe v. Wade cheered conservatives — promised in the 2016 campaign to pick a justice from a list that was created by conservative judicial activists, and he has promised to release another list before 2024.
At his stops Wednesday in Council Bluffs, Pella and Salix, Iowa, DeSantis directed his verbal assaults at President Joe Biden and kept his swipes at Trump more oblique.
“Our great American comeback tour starts by send
ing Joe Biden back to his basement in Delaware,” he said in Council Bluffs.
In contrast, DeSantis criticized Trump, a former reality television star, indirectly though pointedly.
“The Bible makes very clear that God frowns upon pride and looks to people who have humility,” he said.
-The climate crisis is becoming a financial crisis.
This month, the largest homeowner insurance company in California, State Farm, announced that it would stop selling coverage to homeowners. That’s not just in wildfire zones, but everywhere in the state.
Insurance companies, tired of losing money, are raising rates, restricting coverage or pulling out of some areas altogether — making it more expensive for people to live in their homes.
“Risk has a price,” said Roy Wright, the former official in charge of insurance at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and now head of the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety, a research group. “We’re just now seeing it.”
In parts of eastern Kentucky ravaged by storms last summer, the price of flood insurance is set to quadruple. In Louisiana, the top insurance official says the market is in crisis, and is offering millions of dollars in subsidies to try to draw insurers to the state.
And in much of Florida, homeowners are increasingly struggling to buy storm coverage. Most big insurers have pulled out of the state already, sending homeowners to smaller private companies that are straining to stay in business — a possible glimpse into California’s future if more big insurers leave.
Growing ‘catastrophe exposure’ State Farm, which insures more homeowners in California than any other company, said it would stop accepting applications for most types of new insurance policies in the state because of “rapidly growing catastrophe exposure.”
The company said that while it recognized the work of California officials to reduce losses from wildfires, it had to stop writing new policies “to improve the company’s financial strength.” A State Farm spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
Insurance rates in California jumped after wildfires became more devastating than anyone had anticipated. A series of fires that broke out in 2017, many ignited by sparks from failing utility equipment, exploded in size with the effects of climate change. Some homeowners lost their insurance entirely because insurers refused to cover homes in vulnerable areas.
A broken model
California’s woes resemble a slow-motion version of what Florida experienced after Hu-
rricane Andrew devastated Miami in 1992. The losses bankrupted some insurers and caused most national carriers to pull out of the state.
In response, Florida established a complicated system: a market based on small insurance companies, backed up by Citizens Property Insurance Corp., a state-mandated company that would provide windstorm coverage for homeowners who couldn’t find private insurance.
For a while, it mostly worked. Then came Hurricane Irma.
The 2017 hurricane, which made landfall in the Florida Keys as a Category 4 storm before moving up the coast, didn’t cause a particularly great amount of damage. But it was the first in a series of storms, culminating in Hurricane Ian last October, that broke the model insurers had relied on: One bad year of claims, followed by a few quiet years to build back their reserves.
Since Irma, almost every year has been bad.
Private insurers began to struggle to pay their claims; some went out of business. Those that survived increased their rates significantly.
More people have left the private market for Citizens, which recently became the state’s largest insurance provider, according to Michael Peltier, a spokesperson. But Citizens won’t cover homes with a replacement cost of more than $700,000, or $1 million in MiamiDade County and the Florida Keys.
That leaves those homeowners with no choice but private coverage — and in parts of the state, that coverage is getting harder to find, Peltier said.
‘Just not enough wealth’
Florida, despite its challenges, has an important advantage: A steady of influx of residents who remain, for now, willing and able to pay the rising cost of living there. In Louisiana, the rising cost of insurance has become, for some communities, a threat to their existence.
Like Florida after Andrew, Louisiana’s insurance market started to buckle after insurers began leaving following Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Then, starting with Hurricane Laura in 2020, a series of storms pummeled the state. Nine insurance companies failed; people began rushing into the state’s own version of Florida’s Citizens plan.
The state’s insurance market “is in crisis,” Louisiana’s insurance commissioner, James J. Donelon, said in an interview.
In December, Louisiana had to increase premiums for coverage provided by its Citizens plan by 63%, to an average of $4,700 a year.
In March, it borrowed $500 million from the bond market to pay the claims of homeowners who had been abandoned when their private insurers failed, Donelon said. The state recently agreed to new subsidies for private insurers, essentially paying them to do business in the state.
Donelon said he hoped that the subsidies would stabilize the market. But Jesse Keenan, a professor at Tulane University in New Orleans and an expert in climate adaptation and finance, said the state’s insurance market would be hard to turn around. The high cost of insurance has begun to affect home prices, he said.
In the past, it would have been possible for some communities — those where homes are passed down from generation to generation, with no mortgages required and no banks demanding insurance — to go without insurance altogether. But as climate change makes storms more intense, that’s no longer an option.
“There’s just not enough wealth in those low-income communities to continue to rebuild, storm after storm,” Keenan said.
Even as homeowners in coastal states face rising costs for wind coverage, they’re being squeezed from yet another direction: Flood insurance.
In 1968, Congress created the National Flood Insurance Program, which offered taxpayer-backed coverage to homeowners. As with wildfires in California and hurricanes in Florida, the flood program arose from what
economists call a market failure: Private insurers wouldn’t provide coverage for flooding, leaving homeowners with no options.
The program achieved its main goal, of making flood insurance widely available at a price that homeowners could afford. But as storms became more severe, the program faced growing losses.
In 2021, FEMA, which runs the program, began setting rates equal to the actual flood risk facing homeowners — an effort to better communicate the true danger facing different properties, and also to stanch the losses for the government.
Those increases, which are being phased in over years, in some cases amount to enormous jumps in price. The current cost of flood insurance for single-family homes nationwide is $888 a year, according to FEMA. Under the new, risk-based pricing, that average cost would be $1,808.
The best way for policymakers to help keep insurance affordable is to reduce the risk people face, said Carolyn Kousky, associate vice president for economics and policy at the Environmental Defense Fund. For example, officials could impose tougher building standards in vulnerable areas.
Government-mandated programs, like the flood insurance plan, or Citizens in Florida and Louisiana, were meant to be a backstop to the private market. But as climate shocks get worse, she said, “we’re now at the point where that’s starting to crack.”
The prices of oil, transportation, food ingredients and other raw materials have fallen in recent months as the shocks stemming from the pandemic and the war in Ukraine have faded. Yet many big businesses have continued raising prices at a rapid clip.
Some of the world’s biggest companies have said they do not plan to change course and will continue increasing prices or keep them at elevated levels for the foreseeable future.
That strategy has cushioned corporate profits. And it could keep inflation robust, contributing to the very pressures used to justify surging prices.
As a result, some economists warn, policymakers at the Federal Reserve may feel compelled to keep raising interest rates, or at least not lower them, increasing the likelihood and severity of an economic downturn.
“Companies are not just maintaining margins, not just passing on cost increases. They have used it as a cover to expand margins,” Albert Edwards, a global strategist at Société Générale, said, referring to profit margins, a measure of how much businesses earn from every dollar of sales.
PepsiCo has become a prime example of how large corporations have countered increased costs, and then some.
Hugh Johnston, the company’s chief financial officer, said in February that PepsiCo had raised its prices by enough to buffer further cost pressures in 2023. At the end of April, the company reported it had raised the average price across its products by 16% in the first three
months of the year. That added to a similar size price increase in the fourth quarter of 2022 and increased its profit margin.
“I don’t think our margins are going to deteriorate at all,” Johnston said in a recent interview with Bloomberg TV. “In fact, what we’ve said for the year is we’ll be at least even with 2022 and may, in fact, increase margins during the course of the year.”
The snacks and beverages sold by PepsiCo are now substantially pricier. Customers have grumbled, but they have largely kept buying. Shareholders have cheered. PepsiCo declined to comment.
Other companies that sell consumer
goods have also done well while continuing to raise prices.
The average company in the S&P 500 stock index increased its net profit margin from the end of last year, according to FactSet, a data and research firm, countering the expectations of Wall Street analysts that profit margins would decline slightly. And although margins are below their peak in 2021, analysts forecast that they will keep expanding in the second half of the year.
For much of the past two years, most companies “had a perfectly good excuse to go ahead and raise prices,” said Samuel Rines, an economist and the managing director of Corbu, a research firm that serves hedge funds and other investors. “Everybody knew that the war in Ukraine was inflationary, that grain prices were going up, blah, blah, blah. And they just took advantage of that.”
But those go-to rationales for elevating prices, he added, are now receding.
The producer price index, which measures the prices businesses pay for goods and services before they are sold to consumers, reached a high of 11.7% last spring. That rate plunged to 2.3% for the 12 months through April.
The consumer price index, which tracks the prices of household expenditures on everything from eggs to rent, has also been falling, but at a much slower rate. In April, it dropped to 4.93%, from a high of 9.06% last June. The price of carbonated drinks rose nearly 12% in April from 12 months earlier.
“Inflation is going to stay much higher than it needs to be, because companies are being greedy,” Edwards of Société Générale said.
But analysts who distrust that explanation said there were other reasons consumer prices remained high. Since inflation spiked in the spring of 2021, some economists have made the case that as households emerged from the pandemic, demand for goods and services — whether garage doors or cruise trips — was left unsated because of lockdowns and constrained supply chains, driving prices higher.
David Beckworth, a senior research fellow at the right-leaning Mercatus Center at George Mason University and a former economist for the Treasury Department, said he was skeptical that the rapid pace of price increases was “profit-led.”
Corporations had some degree of cover for raising prices as consumers were peppered with news about imbalances in the economy. Yet Beckworth and others contend that those higher prices wouldn’t have been possible if people weren’t willing or able to spend more. In this analysis, stimulus payments from the government, investment gains, pay raises and the refinancing of mortgages at very low interest rates play a larger role in higher prices than corporate profit seeking.
“It seems to me that many telling the profit story forget that households have to actually spend money for the story to hold,” Beckworth said. “And once you look at the huge surge in spending, it becomes inescapable to me where the causality lies.”
Some companies are beginning to find resistance from more price-sensitive customers. Dollar Tree reported rising sales but falling margins, as lower-income customers who tend to shop there searched for deals. Shares in the company plunged Thursday as it cut back its profit expectations for the rest of the year. Even PepsiCo and McDonald’s have recently taken hits to their share prices as traders fear that they may not be able to keep increasing their profits.
For now, though, investors appear to be relieved that corporations did as well as they did in the first quarter, which has helped keep stock prices from falling broadly.
Savita Subramanian, head of U.S. equity and quantitative strategy at Bank of America, wrote in a note that the latest quarterly reports “once again showed corporate America’s ability to preserve margins.” Her team raised overall earnings growth expectations for the rest of the year, and 2024.
Global equities rose on Thursday after the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to raise the federal debt ceiling, while U.S. Treasury yields fell as data reflected a cooling labor market that reduces the possibility of an interest rate hike by the Federal Reserve.A bill that suspends the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling - and averts a catastrophic government default - sailed through the House of Representatives on Wednesday after a majority of both Democrats and Republicans backed the measure despite opposition from hardline members of both parties. The U.S. Senate will follow up by considering the bill.
David Klink, senior equity analyst at Huntington Private Bank, said the debt-ceiling deal seems to have been well-telegraphed, with investors - conditioned by the debt dramas of the past decade - knowing it was coming.
“So it was like, buy the rumor, sell the news,” Klink said.
The MSCI world equity index, which tracks shares in almost 50 countries, added 1.1%. The pan-European STOXX 600 index rose 0.78% after closing at a two-month low in the previous session.
On Wall Street, all three main indexes rose, led by stocks in technology, communication services, healthcare, industrials and financials.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.47% to 33,061.57, the S&P 500 gained 0.99% to 4,221.02 and the Nasdaq Composite added 1.28% to 13,100.98.
U.S. Treasury yields fell after Labor Department data on Thursday showed U.S. worker productivity slumped in the first quarter, indicating an easing of the tight labor market and reducing the likelihood of a rate hike.
The yield on benchmark U.S. 10-year Treasury notes dropped to 3.607%, while the yield on the 30-year Treasury bond was down at 3.826%.
The U.S. dollar drifted from a two-month high as investors trimmed bets based on lower rate hike expectations, while the euro recovered from a two-month low after European Central Bank (ECB) President Christine Lagarde said inflation remained too high and further policy tightening was necessary.
The dollar index fell 0.586%, with the euro up 0.68% to $1.0761.
Oil prices were buoyed by optimism from the passage of the debt ceiling bill that could underpin consumer demand despite reports that U.S. crude inventories rose by about 5.2 million barrels last week.
Brent crude futures settled up 2.3% to $74.65 a barrel, their biggest daily gains since May 17. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude (WTI) climbed 3% to settle at $70.10 a barrel, recording its biggest daily gains since May 5.
Gold gained nearly 1% to a more than one-week peak
on Thursday, as the dollar tumbled. Spot gold added 0.8% to $1,978.01 an ounce, while U.S. gold futures gained 0.73% to $1,978.30 an ounce.
Russia targeted the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, yet again with a missile attack in the early hours of Thursday, killing three people, including a mother and child who were not able to get into a shelter, officials said. Loud explosions were heard just minutes after air-raid sirens sounded throughout the city, waking residents worn out by a month of relentless attacks.
Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said on the Telegram messaging app that an additional 16 people were injured by debris from air defense systems shooting down incoming attacks. Ukraine’s general staff headquarters said Kyiv had been attacked by a volley of 10 Iskander ballistic missiles, all of which were shot down.
The city’s military administration said some of the debris fell on a clinic and an adjacent building. A mother and child were killed minutes after the air-raid alert while trying to get into a shelter at the clinic, according to Klitschko and two emergency workers at the scene who declined to be named because they were not authorized to speak to the news media.
The mother and child who died were not immediately identified.
A man who lives near the clinic and who gave his name as Yaroslav told the Ukrainian public broadcaster Suspilne that his 33-yearold wife, Natalya, was also killed after she and their 9-year-old daughter, Polina, were unable to get into the shelter.
Yaroslav said a number of people were trying desperately to get in. “People were
knocking, knocking for a very long time,” he said, adding, “There were women and children and nobody opened it.”
After what he described as an explosion, Yaroslav found Natalya bleeding alongside a blanket she brought for their daughter and a blue bag carrying family documents, according to the Suspilne report. His daughter, who was not injured, saw what happened to her mother, Yaroslav said.
City officials opened a criminal investigation into the clinic and the administrators responsible for operating the shelter there, centered on whether the shelter was properly maintained and why it may have been inaccessible, Klitschko said. Police officers will
now patrol bomb shelters during air raids to make sure they are open, he added.
“Now the investigation is establishing whether the shelter was open,” he said on Telegram.
It was yet another night that Kyiv’s 3.6 million residents were jolted out of bed and sent scurrying for cover. The overnight attack early Thursday left very little time for residents to take shelter, with air defenses colliding with missiles six minutes after the alarm sounded, the Kyiv military administration said.
Throughout May, residents were dogged by 17 waves of aerial attacks coming at all hours, including assaults with drones and
ballistic and hypersonic missiles.
While Kyiv has been attacked since the first days of the war, the pace and intensity of the Russian assaults over the past month have been jarring even for civilians now accustomed to spending hours in bomb shelters and sleepless nights huddled in corridors. Thursday’s strikes seemed to suggest that the campaign would continue into June.
On Wednesday, in a speech commemorating International Children’s Day, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine said that at least 483 Ukrainian children had been killed since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, and that untold others had had their rights to a safe environment, education and health care violated by Russia’s invasion. Other estimates say the number of children killed may be even higher.
“For 15 months, Russian aggression and terror have been destroying not just buildings, but fundamental human rights — the fundamental rights of our children,” he said.
Officials in Kyiv said that some Children’s Day events scheduled for Thursday had been canceled.
The week started with a rare daytime attack on the Ukrainian capital, when missiles roared into Kyiv shortly after 11 a.m. Monday and sent schoolchildren running in fear. Every missile was intercepted by the air defense systems, but debris caused fires and other damage.
Russian forces have changed the timing of bombardments, the combination of weapons used and the trajectories of missiles and drones, lately flying them low along riverbeds and through valleys to avoid detection, Ukrainian officials say.
Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, arrived in Cape Town on Thursday amid a diplomatic storm over whether South Africa will honor an International Criminal Court arrest warrant for President Vladimir Putin.
Putin is expected to travel to South Africa, a member of the court, in August to attend a summit meeting of BRICS nations — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — with the court’s arrest warrant hanging over his visit. His foreign minister, Lavrov, is in South Africa this week to prepare for that meeting.
The issue has triggered a public debate over South Africa’s membership in the court, pitting the governing African National Congress’ historical ties with Russia against the
country’s economic ties with the United States and Europe.
Lavrov is fresh off a whirlwind trip around East Africa that included meetings with leaders of Kenya, Burundi and Mozambique, as Moscow shores up the support of its allies in Africa. Lavrov and his South African counterpart, Naledi Pandor, are expected to discuss the ICC warrant. South Africa must balance its obligations to the court charged with investigating war crimes and the country’s ties with Russia.
Putin’s expected attendance at the August meeting has become a fraught political issue for South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, and his government. The international warrant, which cites Putin’s role in the abduction and deportation of Ukrainian children, has isolated Putin, a leader with an aura of impunity.
This week, South Africa’s Foreign Ministry said the summit would be protected by diplomatic immunity.
That immunity, however, is “not for specific individuals,” the ministry said.
“These immunities do not override any warrant that may have been issued by any international tribunal against any attendee of the conference,” the Department of International Relations and Cooperation, a division of the Foreign Ministry, said in a statement.
At the same time, South Africa’s main opposition party, the Democratic Alliance, approached a high court for a declaratory order on South Africa’s obligation to honor the ICC warrant. The party hopes the court order will leave no ambiguity about whether South African officials are legally bound to detain Putin and extradite him to The Hague, Netherlands. The party also wants a judge to clarify the process of arresting a sitting president, said Glynnis Breytenbach, a party lawmaker.
As polar ice melts, Russia, already a major Arctic power, wants to make the region its own. China has ambitions for a “Polar Silk Road.” And NATO is embracing Finland — and Sweden too, Washington hopes — giving the alliance new reach in the Far North.
Climate change is accelerating and amplifying competition in the Arctic as never before, opening the region to greater commercial and strategic jostling just at a moment when Russia, China and the West are all seeking to expand their military presence there.
The rising importance of the region is underscored by the travels of U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who was to attend an informal meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Norway on Thursday.
Blinken is making a point of visiting Sweden and Finland as well, meeting the leaders of all three countries as they press Turkey to ratify Sweden’s quick entry into NATO. He is scheduled to deliver a major speech on Russia, Ukraine and NATO on Friday in Helsinki, the capital of NATO’s newest member.
For a long time, countries were reluctant to discuss the Arctic as a possible military zone. But that is quickly changing.
Russian aggression plus climate change make “a perfect storm,” said Matti Pesu, an analyst at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. There is a new cold war atmosphere, mixed with melting ice, which affects military planning and opens up new economic possibilities and access to natural resources.
“So all these are connected and are magnifying each other,” Pesu said. “It makes the region intriguing.”
While NATO has been cheered by Russia’s difficulties in Ukraine, the alliance in fact has significant vulnerabilities in the north.
Russia remains a vast Arctic power, with naval bases and nuclear missiles stationed in the Far North but also along Russia’s western edge: in the Kola Peninsula, near Norway, where Russia keeps most of its nuclear-armed submarines, and in Kaliningrad, bordered by Poland and Lithuania.
With climate change, shipping routes are becoming less icebound and easier to navigate, making the Arctic more accessible and attractive for competitive commercial exploitation, as well as military adventurism.
Russia has said it wants to make the Arctic its own — a fifth military district, on a par with its other four — said Robert Dalsjo, research director at the Swedish Defense Research Agency.
China has also been busy trying to establish itself in the region and use new unfrozen routes, one reason the NATO considers China a significant security challenge.
In its most recent strategy paper, adopted last summer in Madrid, NATO declared Russia to be “the most significant and direct threat to allies’ security and to peace and stability,” but for the first time addressed China, saying that its “stated ambitions and coercive policies challenge our interests, security and values.”
How to create a “northern bubble” to deter Russia and monitor China is one of NATO’s newest and biggest challenges.
Until now, competition in the region was largely mediated through the Arctic Council, founded in 1996, which includes Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the United States, and promotes research and cooperation.
But it does not have a security component, and soon all members but Russia will be NATO members. The council has been “paused” since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. When Russia’s chairmanship ended in May, Norway took over, so activity may pick up again.
Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 caused rethinking throughout NATO, and there was new anxiety about the Baltic States — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania — combined with submarine hunts in Sweden and more serious war gaming, said Anna Wieslander, the director for Northern Europe at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based research institution.
Gen. Philip Breedlove, then the supreme allied commander of Europe, called for “an anti-access area denial” — to deny Russia entry to the Baltic Sea from Kaliningrad, the isolated Russian toehold with access to the sea.
China started making inroads around 2018, trying to buy ports in Finland and mines in Greenland, opening scientific research stations as it pursues its “Polar Silk Road,” Wieslander
said, prompting former President Donald Trump to offer to buy Greenland.
Washington started reinvesting militarily in the Arctic then with more ships, planes and military exercises, as did other NATO countries in the region. In 2018 NATO went so far as to set up a new operational command — a kind of regional headquarters that plans and conducts military operations to defend specific areas of NATO. The new command, based in Norfolk, Virginia, is navy-focused and defends the Atlantic sea routes, Scandinavia and the Arctic.
There remains a concern that China, which now has even closer ties to Russia, remains active in the Far North, building big icebreakers. “China will reach Europe through the Arctic,” Wieslander said.
One main question is whether the real Russian threat to Scandinavia will come from the sea, as Norway fears, or from the land, with a possible Russian invasion of the Baltic States or Finland, then a move westward.
Both Finland and Sweden, when it joins, want to be part of the same NATO operational command, given their long history of defense cooperation.
Norway belongs to the Norfolk command, and there is a logic to making both Finland and Sweden part of that command, since reinforcements would likely come from the West, across the Atlantic.
But there is perhaps more logic, given the current threat from Russia, for them to join the land-oriented command based in Brunssum, the Netherlands, which is charged with defending Central and Eastern Europe, including Poland and the Baltic nations.
“There is logic for both,” said Niklas Granholm, deputy director of studies at the Swedish Defense Research Agency. “It’s not yet resolved.”
When Yasemin Oz, a lesbian lawyer in Istanbul, heard President Recep Tayyip Erdogan claiming victory after a runoff election Sunday, she said she feared for the future. In his speech, he declared “family is sacred for us” and insisted that LGBTQ people would never “infiltrate” his governing party.
They were familiar themes, heard often throughout Erdogan’s campaign for reelection: He frequently attacked LGBTQ people, referring to them as “deviants” and saying they were “spreading like the plague.” But Oz said she had hoped it was just electioneering to rally the president’s conservative base.
“I was already worried about what was to come for us,” said Oz, 49. But after the speech, she thought, “it will get harsher.”
The rights and freedoms of LGBTQ citizens became a lightning-rod issue during this year’s election campaign. Erdogan, facing the greatest political threat of his two decades as the country’s dominant leader and seeking to woo conservatives, repeatedly attacked his opponents for supposedly supporting gay rights. The anti-Erdogan opposition mostly avoided the topic for fear of alienating some of its own voters.
That left many LGBTQ people fearing that the discrimination they have long faced by the government and conservative parts of society could worsen — and feeling that no one in the country had their backs.
“People are scared and having dystopian thoughts like, ‘Are we going to be slashed or violently attacked in the middle of the street?’” said Ogulcan Yediveren, a coordinator at SPoD, an LGBTQ advocacy group in Istanbul.
“What will happen is that people will hide their identities, and that is bad enough.”
Turkey, a predominantly Muslim society with a secular state, does not criminalize homosexuality and has laws against discrimination. But in recent conversations, more than a dozen LGBTQ people said they often struggled to find jobs, secure housing and get quality health care as well as to be accepted by their friends, relatives, neighbors and coworkers.
In recent years, they said, they have encountered new restrictions on their visibility in society. Universities have shut down LGBTQ student clubs. And since 2014, authorities have banned Pride parades in major cities, including in Istanbul, where crowds in the tens of thousands used to participate.
That tracks with Erdogan’s vision for Turkey.
Since the start of his national political career in 2003, he has increased his own power
while promoting a conservative Muslim view of society. He insists that marriage can only be between a man and a woman and encourages women to have three children to build the nation.
Rights advocates say that as Erdogan has gained power, his conservative outlook has filtered down, encouraging local authorities to restrict LGBTQ activities and pushing security forces to crack down on gay rights activism.
Anti-LGBTQ rhetoric was more prominent during this election than in past cycles, even though there are no looming legal changes that would expand or limit rights. No political party is trying to legalize same-sex marriage or adoption, for example, or expand medical care for transgender youth.
Instead, Erdogan and his allies use the issue to galvanize conservatives.
“What they want to impose on society in terms of other values is full of hatred and violence toward us,” said Nazlican Dogan, 26, who is facing legal charges related to participation in pro-LGBTQ protests at Bogazici University in Istanbul. “It was really ugly, and it made us feel that we can’t exist in this country, like I should just leave.”
During his campaign, Erdogan characterized LGBTQ people as a threat to society.
“If the concept of family is not strong, the destruction of the nation happens quickly,” he told young people during a televised meeting in early May. “LGBT is a poison injected into the institution of the family. It is not possible for us to accept that poison as a country whose people are 99% Muslim.”
In April, his interior minister, Suleyman Soylu, went even further, falsely claiming that gay rights would allow humans to marry animals.
SPoD, the advocacy group, asked parliamentary candidates during the campaign to
sign a contract to protect LGBTQ rights. Fiftyeight candidates signed, and 11 of them won seats in the 600-member legislature, said Yediveren, the coordinator.
His group has also tried to expand legal protections for LGBTQ people.
While certain laws prohibit discrimination, they do not specifically mention sexual identity or orientation, he said. At the same time, authorities often cite vague concepts like “general morals” and “public order” to act against activities they don’t like, such as Pride week events.
“This week is very important because we don’t have physical locations we can come together as a community to support each other,” said Bambi Ceren, 34, a member of a committee planning events for this year’s Pride week, which begins June 19.
Last year, police prevented Pride events and arrested people who gathered to take part, committee members said.
SPoD runs a national hotline to field queries about sexual orientation, legal protections or how to access medical care or other services. The group can solve most issues related to services, Yediveren said, but most callers’ problems are social and emotional.
“People are feeling very lonely and isolated,” he said.
And the threat of violence is real.
Some LGBTQ people said they had been beaten by the security forces during protests or met with indifference from police while being harassed on the street.
A survey last year by ILGA-Europe, a rights organization, ranked Turkey second-tolast out of 49 European countries on LGBTQ rights. Another group, Transgender Europe, said that 62 transgender people had been killed in Turkey between 2008 and 2022.
Many LGBTQ people fear that the demonization during the campaign will make that threat more acute.
A queer university student from Turkey’s Kurdish minority, who grew up in a smaller city with no significant LGBTQ presence, said she feared that bad days were ahead.
People who would not normally commit violence might feel empowered to do so because the government had spread hatred for people like her, she said, claiming they were sick, dangerous or a threat to the family. She spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of being attacked.
Despite the increased danger, many LGBTQ people vowed to keep fighting for their rights and maintaining their visibility in society. To deal with the fear of random attacks, they plan to look out for one another more to ensure they are safe.
The world is experiencing an energy revolution. Over the past 15 years or so, huge technological progress has, in many cases, made it cheaper to generate electricity from solar and wind power than by burning fossil fuels. The Inflation Reduction Act — which is, despite its name, mainly a climate bill — aims to accelerate the transition to renewables and also to electrify as much of the economy as possible; this effort, if it works quickly enough and is emulated by other countries, could help us avert climate catastrophe.
Even before the act started to take effect, however, America was experiencing a renewable energy boom. And the boom has been led by a surprising place: Texas.
To be fair, California has more solar power, and a lot of geothermal electricity, too. But Texas dominates in wind power. And overall California is, even progressives have to admit, a state where NIMBYism sometimes seems to slide into BANANA territory — as in “build absolutely nothing anywhere near anyone.” That’s why housing is so scarce and expensive, and red tape has snarled green energy, too. Texas, whatever its flaws (which are many), is a place where things can get built, and that has included a lot of wind turbines.
You might think, then, that Texas politicians would be celebrating the renewables boom, which is both good for the state’s economy and an advertisement for the state’s laissezfaire policies.
But no. Republicans in the Texas Legislature have turned
hard against renewable energy, with a raft of proposed measures that would subsidize fossil fuels, impose restrictions that might block many renewable energy projects and maybe even shut down many existing facilities. The worst of these measures don’t seem to have made it into the latest legislation, but even so, that legislation strongly favors fossil fuels over an industry that arguably reflects Texas’s energy future.
So what’s going on here? Why do Texas Republicans now see the wind as an enemy? You might think that the answer is greed, and that’s surely part of it. But the bigger picture, I’d argue, is that renewable energy has become a victim of the anti-woke mind virus.
First, about greed. Yes, Texas is a state where what big business wants, big business gets. And the fossil fuel industry has a long history of doing what it can to block climate action, not just by lobbying against green energy policies but also by promoting climate denialism.
Yet there are several reasons to doubt whether Texas’ turn against renewables is a simple story of corporate greed. For one thing, renewable energy in Texas is already a big business itself, having attracted billions in investment and employing thousands of workers, which should act as a counterweight to fossil fuel interests.
Furthermore, a lot of Texas investment in green energy is actually coming from companies with roots in fossil fuels. So even some oil and gas companies have a financial stake in allowing the renewable boom to continue.
Finally, oil and gas are traded on world markets. The prices producers receive, and hence their profits, are determined more by global events like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine than by where Texas gets its electricity (although this obviously matters for the owners of power plants).
So I don’t think Texas’ rejection of its own energy success is entirely, or even mainly, about greed. Instead, renewables have been caught up in the culture wars. In a way, it’s a lot like Ron DeSantis’ confrontation with The Walt Disney Co., which looks just crazy from a policy point of view — why undermine tourism, one of the pillars of Florida’s economy? But these days it’s often important not to follow the money.
Right-wingers like Elon Musk and DeSantis have become fond of citing the alleged power of the “woke mind virus” to explain why major corporations are tolerant of and even cater to social liberalism. They need to invoke this mysterious contagion to avoid accepting the obvious explanation: Most Americans have become relatively liberal on social matters — look at the transformation of attitudes on samesex marriage — and corporations have been adjusting to their customer base.
But while talk of the woke mind virus manages to be both sinister and silly, I’d argue that there really is what we might call an anti-woke mind virus — a contagion that spreads not across people but across issues.
Here’s how it works. A significant faction of Americans, which increasingly dominates the
Republican Party, hates anything it considers woke — which in this faction’s eyes means both any acknowledgment of social injustice and any suggestion that people should make sacrifices, or even accept mild inconvenience, in the name of the public good. So there’s rage against the idea that racism was and still is an evil for which society should make some amends; there’s also rage against the idea that people should, say, wear masks during a pandemic to protect others, or cut down on activities that harm the environment.
This rage is somewhat understandable, if not forgivable. But the weird thing is the way that it infects attitudes on issues that don’t actually involve wokeism but are seen as woke-adjacent
The now-classic example is the way hostility to mask mandates, which were mainly about protecting others, turned into highly partisan opposition to COVID vaccination, which is mainly about protecting yourself. Logically, this carry-over makes no sense; but it happened anyway.
The same thing, I’d argue, applies to energy policy. At this point, investing in renewable energy is simply a good business proposition; Texas Republicans have had to abandon their own free-market, anti-regulation ideology in the effort to strangle wind and solar power. But renewable energy is something environmentalists favor; it’s being promoted by the Biden administration. So in the minds of Texas right-wingers the wind has become woke, and wind power has become something to be fought even if it hurts business and costs the state both money and jobs.
If all this sounds crazy, that’s because it is. But that’s Texas — and, I fear, much of America — in 2023.
SAN JUAN – El portavoz del Partido Nuevo Progresista (PNP) en la Cámara de Representantes, Carlos ‘Johnny’ Méndez, informó que recibió en la tarde del jueves de Fortaleza la resolución de presupuesto
para el año fiscal 2023-2024 y que la delegación estará evaluando el mismo con detalle y premura.
“En la tarde de hoy recibimos del Gobernador la Resolución de presupuesto para el próximo año fiscal que inicia el 1 de julio. Como deben saber, la medida es muy voluminosa y con mucho detalle la cual requiere una evaluación minuciosa. Nuestra delegación estará evaluando la misma en los próximos días antes de emitir algún comentario”, señaló el líder del PNP en la Cámara Baja.
Para el expresidente cameral, la medida debe contener iniciativas para el desarrollo económico, ayuda a los municipios, justicia salarial para los servidores públicos, así como apoyo a las islas municipio de Vieques y Culebra, entre otros.
“Hemos sido consistentes siempre en este punto, el presupuesto del gobierno, además de sufragar los servicios básicos al Pueblo, debería ser un mecanis-
mo para el desarrollo de la economía. Eso es algo que estaremos estudiando bien detalladamente. De igual forma, vamos a evaluar las ayudas a los municipios y que se encuentren identificados los fondos para brindarle ese aumento de salario a nuestros servidores públicos, esos hombres y mujeres que trabajan por el Pueblo y no han recibido incremento en compensación desde hace mucho tiempo”, añadió Méndez.
El Portavoz novoprogresista indicó además, que estará mirando los renglones de salud, la Universidad de Puerto Rico y la seguridad.
“Esta Resolución debe contener fondos para pagar médicos residentes en la Universidad de Puerto Rico, al igual que para hacer otra academia de la Policía, entre otros. También debe tocar los fondos para los municipios, que son la primera línea de ayuda al ciudadano”, sostuvo el legislador.
CEIBA – Un acuerdo con la empresa que administra el estacionamiento del Terminal de Lanchas del Municipio de Ceiba, Smart Parking, para reducir el costo diario de 20 a 15 dólares fue alcanzado este jueves, según lo anunció el alcalde de Ceiba, Samuel Rivera Báez, junto a José Corcino Acevedo, alcalde de Vieques, Marissa Jiménez Santoni, senadora del Distrito de Carolina, y Nilda Marchán, directora ejecutiva para el Autoridad para el Redesarrollo de Roosevelt Road.
“Somos un equipo sumamente comprometido con las islas de Vieques y Culebra”, expresó Rivera Báez en declaracio es escritas. “Cada reclamo que nos llega, lo atendemos con responsabilidad, seriedad y prontitud”, añadió.
“Logramos bajar la tarifa del estacionamiento. Los
alcaldes de Vieques y Culebra tienen en mí un gran amigo incondicional, un aliado dispuesto a colaborar con sus necesidades”, añadió el alcalde de Ceiba.
Asimismo, se estableció que la tarifa mensual preferencial para los residentes de ambas islas continúa en 35 dólares.
“De 20 dólares diarios logramos bajar la tarifa a 15 dólares diarios, permitiendo así que los turistas y visitantes puedan utilizar el estacionamiento y disfrutar de las bellezas de ambas islas. Además, permanece la tarifa mensual para los residentes”, declaró Jiménez Santoni, quien agradeció la ayuda de Marchán en estas gestiones.
Finalmente, la senadora subrayó un reclamo recurrente de los residentes: “En muchas ocasiones, les dicen que ya todo está vendido para el transporte de vehículos de motor, pero, cuando sale el ferry, se dan
cuenta de que la realidad es otra. Mi recomendación es que esos espacios que no se llenen, media hora antes de salir el ferry, sean puestos a la disposición de los residentes que están esperando en el muelle”.
S AN JUAN – El secretario del Departamento de Justicia, Domingo Emanuelli Hernández, anunció el jueves, que la Fiscalía de Guayama presentó cargos de trata humana, agresión sexual y maltrato de menores contra Carlos Casiano Rodríguez y Elvimarie Claudio Rodríguez.
“Los hechos de este caso son deplorables y repudiables”, dijo el secretario de Justicia en comunicación escrita. “Estas personas se aprovecharon de la vulnerabilidad de una niña para explotarla y abusar sexualmente de ella”, añadió.
Según la investigación, en julio de 2015, Claudio Rodríguez supuestamente llevó a la menor a distintas localidades en Guayama para que Casiano Rodríguez la explotara sexualmente. A cambio, Claudio Rodríguez recibió pagos o beneficios.
El juez Ángel Rodríguez, del Tribunal de Primera Instancia de Guayama, después de escuchar la prueba presentada, determinó causa para arresto y fijó una fianza de doscientos sesenta mil dólares a cada imputado.
La agente Yanixia Sánchez Soto, de la División de Delitos Sexuales y Maltrato de Menores del Negociado de la Policía, estuvo a cargo de la investigación. La vista preliminar fue programada para el 12 de junio.
In the 2018 animated hit “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse,” Miles Morales, a Brooklyn teenage superhero in development, receives multiple unexpected visits from other dimensions. For the film’s sequel, “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” it’s Morales (voiced by Shameik Moore) who must follow Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld), a version of Spider-Woman, into new realms where other spider people exist.
For the films’ directors, Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson, the premise, with Miles now as a traveler and not a host, granted them permission to expand their aesthetic horizons. This time the task wasn’t limited to creating uniquely designed characters inhabiting a single universe, but entire worlds based on the myriad comic book sagas that have reinterpreted Stan Lee and Steve Ditko’s arachnid paladin.
“It’s almost like we’re jumping from one book to another,” Thompson said. “The goal was to take people on a journey and have a celebration of all these different amazing artists.”
To do so, the production went to the source and contacted some of the people behind those alternate “Spider-Man” visions to participate in the development of the film. Rick Leonardi, who designed the comic “Spider-Man 2099,” came on board to help devise 3D animation tools that could
emulate his line work. And Brian Stelfreeze, a seasoned artist for Marvel Comics, was instrumental in formulating the film’s take on Jessica Drew/Spider-Woman.
Calling from different areas in Los Angeles — a city that could be its own SpiderVerse — for a video interview, the three filmmakers dissected some of the other ideas swirling in their reference pool.
Leonardo da Vinci and Royal de Luxe
Early in this multiverse adventure, a villain named Vulture unexpectedly enters Gwen’s colorful world. Native to another reality, the monochromatic character wielding a variety of gadgets, who looks as if drawn on parchment paper, had to clearly and immediately feel foreign to the world he was invading. Sketches by Renaissance artist and inventor Leonardo da Vinci served as a foundation for his design.
“Vulture’s contraptions were like a hyper-realized version of a lot of the insane inventions that da Vinci himself had come up with, which, some of them were crazy, some of them were very forward thinking,” Dos Santos said. “Some of them were frankly horrific.”
Another crucial inspiration during the initial development of the character was the work of Royal de Luxe, a street theater company based in Nantes, France, that specializes in creating large-scale marionettes.
‘Say Anything’
The only quiet alone time Miles and
Continues on page 18
From page 17
Gwen have in the entire film occurs as they both gaze at an inverted New York skyline. As breathtaking and significant as the sequence is, it went in and out of the movie several times.
“It had to really earn its way into the film,” Powers said. Throughout the process, he found himself thinking of Cameron Crowe’s innocent romance “Say Anything.” The male lead in that 1989 film, Lloyd Dobler (John Cusack), tries to persuade his love interest, Diane Court (Ione Skye), to give their unlikely match a chance even though her father disapproves.
“There’s definitely a parallel there because Gwen has these mentor figures in her life who are urging her to stay away from Miles Morales for reasons that our audience will discover,” Powers said.
But, of course, having a swoon-worthy Cameron Crowe moment between two spider people with amazing abilities had to have an extraordinary setting, namely a clock tower while they both hang upside down.
‘Cinderella’
Gwen’s world functions like a mood ring that reacts to her emotions. For example, if she feels angry, the screen turns red and the atmosphere hotter. And when confusion overtakes her, the world becomes fragmented. According to Thompson, the 1950 animated Disney classic “Cindere-
lla” served as a reference.
“As a kid, I remember seeing the scene when Cinderella’s dress is being torn apart by the evil stepsisters, and the backgrounds and the environment start reacting to this emotional trauma that she’s going through,” he said. For him, these moments in Gwen’s reactive microcosm push the film into its most experiential form.
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
The production visited NASA’s research and development center in La Cañada Flintridge, California, to research how cutting-edge technology could apply to the characters in their film. They hoped to figure out how Miguel O’Hara, a brilliant geneticist who becomes the Spider-Man of the year 2099, could create a tear-resistant, high-tech wingsuit with powerful flying capabilities, and what materials it would be made out of if it existed in our world.
To optimize the look of Spider-Byte, a spider person
who fights crime in a cyberspace multiverse and appears translucid, the filmmakers explored current techniques that are on the cusp of creating three-dimensional holograms in real time. “We aren’t just putting her on-screen and then putting her at a slight opacity,” Thompson said. “There are specific techniques that we delved deep into to give her a sense of presence onscreen that feels like she’s beyond just somebody wearing a suit.”
‘Point Break’ and ‘No Country for Old Men’
For Powers, there were two high-water marks of great character development through an action sequence that bled into the retro-futuristic realm of Spider-Man 2099. One of them is the foot chase in Kathryn Bigelow’s “Point Break” where Johnny Utah (Keanu Reeves) tries to catch Bodhi (Patrick Swayze). “It was bizarre and funny, and it implemented things that we’d learned about the characters early in the film, namely that Utah injured his knee playing football,” Powers said. A similar chase unfolds in “Across the Spider-Verse.”
The other reference at the front of Powers’ mind was the Coen brothers’ “No Country for Old Men.” In that film, Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) remains defiant in the face of the psychopathic hit man Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem). Even if there’s an inevitability to how it will all be resolved, Moss fights back and “gets his licks in,” as Powers put it.
“Miles is being chased too,” he added, “but we still want him to get his licks in.”
By JUDY GORDON-CONDE and JENNIFER CONDE-POWERS
Guests reveled in the shimmering decorations and elegant atmosphere in the Great Hall of the Sheraton Puerto Rico Hotel & Casino in the Convention Center District for the Grand Gala of the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico (MAPR), a renowned cultural treasure of the United States by designation of the Ford Foundation.
More than 800 beautifully dressed attendees enjoyed an unforgettable celebration in the setting designed by Javier Martínez from AKUA and The Lounge inspired by the mural Horizonte by the maestro Carmelo Sobrino. As the music of Jibaro Pop played during the cocktail hour, champagne flowed as the doors opened to reveal the awe-inspiring stylish surroundings, with a stage set to welcome Cucco Peña’s All-Star Big Band, while
superstar Manny Manuel made an appearance to sing his popular songs to everyone’s delight. For those staying until the early morning hours, Cuenta Regresiva and characters from SAK Entertainment complemented the festivities.
For foodies, a delicious banquet with seven stations prepared by the hotel’s executive chef Jannette Berríos, along with her culinary team, included such delectable dishes from sausage risotto and malanga arañitas, ravioli stuffed with ossobucco in cognac sauce, to desserts with tropical fruits, and more.
The honorary president of the Gala committee, Caridad Pierluisi, headed the attendee list, along with Juan A. Larrea, chairman of the MAPR board of trustees, and the new MAPR executive director, Dr. María Cristina Gaztambide.
In addition, as usual, the MAPR Grand Gala brought together businesspeople and personalities from culture, the media, banking and the government.
One of the greatest transformations in the history of life occurred more than 600 million years ago, when a singlecelled organism gave rise to the first animals. With their multicellular bodies, animals evolved into a staggering range of forms, like whales that weigh 200 tons, birds that soar 6 miles into the sky and sidewinders that slither across desert dunes. Scientists have long wondered what the first animals were like, including questions about their anatomy and how they found food. In a study published this month, scientists found tantalizing answers in a little-known group of gelatinous creatures called comb jellies. While the first animals remain a mystery, scientists found that comb jellies belong to the deepest branch on the animal family tree.
The debate over the origin of animals has endured for decades. At first, researchers relied largely on the fossil record for clues. The oldest definitive animal fossils date back about 580 million years, although some researchers have claimed to find even older ones. In 2021, for example, Elizabeth Turner, a Canadian paleontologist, reported finding 890-million-year-old fossils of possible sponges.
Sponges would make sense as the oldest animal. They are simple creatures, with no muscles or nervous system. They anchor themselves to the ocean floor, where they filter water through a maze of pores, trapping bits of food.
Sponges are so simple, in fact, that it can come as a surprise that they are animals at all, but their molecular makeup reveals their kinship. They make certain proteins, such as collagen, that are produced only by animals. What’s more, their DNA shows they are more closely related to animals than to other forms of life.
Starting in the 1990s, as scientists gathered DNA from more animal species, they tried to draw the animal family tree. In some studies, the sponges ended up on the deepest branch of the tree. In this scenario, animals evolved a nervous system only after the sponges branched off.
But in the early 2000s, other scientists came to a surprisingly different conclusion. They found that the deepest branch of animals were comb jellies — slim, oval creatures that often grow a distinctive set of iridescent bands that flicker in the darkness of the deep ocean.
Many experts were reluctant to accept that conclusion, because it meant animal evolution was weirder than they had realized. For one thing, comb jellies were not as simple as sponges. They have a nervous system: A web of neurons circling their bodies controls their muscles.
To resolve the comb-jelly-versus-sponge debate, researchers around the world collected DNA from more species of ocean animals. And instead of looking at single genes, researchers figured out how to sequence entire genomes.
But the avalanche of new data failed to settle the debate. Some scientists ended up assembling a tree in which sponges were the deepest branch, while others ended up with comb jellies.
The new study, published in the journal Nature, relied on a new method for using DNA to track animal evolution.
In previous studies, scientists looked at how certain mutations arise in different animal branches. A mutation may cause a single genetic letter, known as a base, to switch to a different letter. That mutation will then be inherited by an animal’s descendants.
But these mutations can be unreliable markers of history. A base may switch from one letter to another, and then millions of years later, it may switch back to the original one. Alternatively, the same base may switch to the same letter in two unrelated lineages. That parallel evolution creates the illusion that the two lineages are closely related.
In the new study, Darrin Schultz, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Vienna, and his colleagues looked instead at a different kind of genetic change. On rare occasion, a huge chunk of DNA will get accidentally moved from one chromosome to another.
This massive mutation is less likely to deceive scientists. The odds that precisely the same chunk of DNA moves to precisely the same location a second time is astronomically low. It’s also next to impossible for that chunk to move back to exactly the spot from which it came.
“It’s direct evidence of something that happened,” Schultz said.
His team tracked the movements of genetic material in the chromosomes of nine animals, along with three single-celled relatives of animals. They found a number of chunks of DNA in precisely the same spot in the genomes of sponges and other animals. But these chunks were in a different position in comb jellies and single-celled relatives of animals. That finding led Schultz and his colleagues to conclude that comb jellies split off from other animals first.
The study raises intriguing new possibilities for what the common ancestor of living animals looked like. If comb jellies,
with a nervous system and muscles, are the deepest branch on the animal tree, then early animals may have not been simple and spongelike. They had nervous systems and muscles too. Only later did sponges abandon their nervous system.
Schultz cautioned against thinking of comb jellies as living fossils, unchanged since the dawn of animals. “Something that’s alive today can’t be the ancestor of something alive today,” he said.
Instead, researchers are looking now to comb jellies to see how similar and different their nervous systems are from those of other animals. Recently, Maike Kittelmann, a cell biologist at Oxford Brookes University, and her colleagues froze comb jelly larvae so that they could get a microscopic look at their nervous system. What they saw left them baffled.
Throughout the animal kingdom, neurons are typically separated from one another by tiny gaps called synapses. They can communicate across the gap by releasing chemicals.
But when Kittelmann and her colleagues started to inspect the comb jelly neurons, they struggled to find a synapse between the neurons. “At that point, we were like, ‘This is curious,’” she said.
In the end, they failed to find any synapses between them. Instead, the comb jelly nervous system forms one continuous web.
When Kittelmann and her colleagues reported their findings last month, they speculated yet another possibility for the origin of animals. Comb jellies may have evolved their own weird nervous system independently of other animals, using some of the same building blocks.
Kittelmann and her colleagues are now inspecting other species of comb jellies to see if that idea holds up. But they won’t be surprised to be surprised again. “You have to assume nothing,” she said.
The pale ruby wine emerged from the bottle with a tinge of orange. It smelled lightly smoky, not as fruity as a grenache ordinarily might but unusually herbal. The aroma would have been right at home at rock concerts and college dorms of a certain era. On the palate, it was beautifully balanced with a lingering aftertaste. It was delicious. It was also illegal.
The producer of this wine was pouring tastes to a few dozen colleagues and friends, along with a wine writer, in a cool, humid barrel room in a Santa Barbara winery. The crowd, jostling for access, seemed to love the wine. I know I did.
That experience, nearly 20 years ago, was my first encounter with weed wine. The memory has lingered like the fragrant haze after a party full of stoners.
Since that first taste, I’ve had the pleasure of trying wines infused with marijuana a half-dozen times or more, on the West Coast, on the East Coast and in France. It hasn’t been common, but occasionally, when the spirit strikes, a winemaker will break out a bottle of homemade wine to pour for friends.
For decades, winemakers with a taste for marijuana have surreptitiously made weed wine, in which cannabis is added to grapes as they ferment, extracting the active components (along with flavors and aromas) to achieve a doubly intoxicating beverage. The process is a bit like adding marijuana to brownies — an early form of what now are called edibles — with the enhancement of wine, all in one serving.
Cannabis is legal for recreational use in 22 states, two territories and Washington, D.C. Cannabis for medical use is permitted in 38 states. It can be sold as chocolates and gummy candies, in nonalcoholic beverages and in creams and rubs. Fine chefs prepare cannabis cuisine. Yet the addition of cannabis to any commercially available alcoholic beverage is strictly prohibited.
The main reason is that cannabis is still illegal federally. As the federal government licenses alcoholic products and wineries, commercial production of weed wine cannot be licensed by the states.
Even states that have legalized marijuana prohibit the blending of two different intoxicants, like alcohol and cannabis. Stores that are licensed to sell alcohol are prohibited from selling cannabis, and vice versa.
While cannabis-infused wines or beers are sold commercially, it’s in name only. These beverages are made with drinks that have been dealcoholized.
But noncommercial weed wine production, for winemakers and their friends, persists, especially with older winemakers who developed a taste for it during the many years when marijuana use was largely a clandestine affair. And it is now legal in California, so long as they don’t sell it.
“I think it’s pretty common,” said Bob Lindquist, who founded Qupé wines in 1982 in Santa Barbara and is now the proprietor of Lindquist Family Wines in Arroyo Grande, California. “A lot of people keep it under their hat. You’re either in the know or not.”
It was Lindquist who made that indelible weed wine I first tried. Back then, I was a lapsed marijuana user, having lost my taste for it in graduate school when the rising potency of generally available cannabis transformed funny, convivial experiences into catatonic trances. But I retained my curiosity about it, and I loved the aroma of that weed wine, which was the impetus to drinking a glass.
Aside from the pleasure of the wine, which offered a gentle, starkly herbal contrast to the powerfully fruity style that prevailed in California back then, it provided an amiable, mellow high, the sort that I remembered fondly where everything seemed just a bit amplified and absurd. I loved this, too, about Lindquist’s weed wines.
“The good old days of weak marijuana,” he said of his wine in a phone interview. “It gives you a good, mellow high without being too stoned.”
Lindquist said he’s been making noncommercial weed wine since the early 1990s, when he learned the technique from Bill Wathen, a founder of Foxen Vineyards in the Santa Maria Valley of Santa Barbara County.
While the method is uncomplicated, it permits myriad variations, depending on a winemaker’s intent and appetite for experimentation. Simply add cannabis to grape juice as it begins to ferment. The process of fermentation produces heat, which extracts the active ingredients, largely THC, which causes the buzz, and cannabidiol, or CBD, which has a relaxing effect.
Winemakers can choose to add the weed early, allowing it to steep in the juice before fermentation begins, and they can allow the wine to age on the cannabis lees, or remnants, after fermentation, both of which will add aromas and flavors.
What was the draw? To Lindquist, the appeal of wine
and weed was clear.
“It combined two things I loved,” he said. “Also, it was very low in THC and very high in CBD. The psychotropic aspects were mild, which was fine, and the CBD warm body hugs were significant.”
Not all weed wines were quite so mellow. Jim Clendenen, a winemaking pioneer in Santa Barbara who was partners with Lindquist in a winemaking facility in the Santa Maria Valley, was another avid practitioner. Clendenen, who died in 2021, would soak the cannabis buds in heated vodka to maximize extraction before adding it to the wine for fermentation, Lindquist recalled.
“His was THC strong!” Lindquist said. “I prefer our method, but I appreciate the difference.”
Pax Mahle, who makes excellent wines in Sonoma County under the Pax label, was inspired by Lindquist and Clendenen to try his hand at weed wines. It might well have been Clendenen’s potent version that he recalls first trying around 2000 at Hospice du Rhône in Paso Robles, a regular gathering of producers and growers specializing in Rhône grapes.
“I had a couple of glasses and had to go right to bed,” he said.
Since then, until recently, he made a batch every other year. Like the other practitioners, he produced it somewhere other than his winery, so as not to conflict with federal regulations, which prohibit marijuana in a licensed winery. He put it in old bottles topped with leftover corks.
Mahle likes to use Rhône grapes like grenache or mourvèdre, and he prefers to make a rosé.
“I only wanted a rosé,” he said. “Red wine didn’t make sense to me. It seemed like kind of a sundowner sip.”
On a recent visit to Mahle in Sebastopol, where he is based, I tasted two of his weed wines, a 2015 grenache rosé, a gentle, herbal wine, and a 2013 mourvèdre rosé, herbal, minty and mineral. I thought the 2013 was especially delicious and showed how well these wines could age. The buzz? I confess, I spit the wines so did not experience the full effect. It seemed the professional thing to do, particularly at 9:30 in the morning.
Lindquist, too, makes a grenache rosé, but especially enjoys a syrah-based dark rosé.
“It has a beautiful color and a lot of bold, meaty, smoky characteristics,” he said. He also likes white versions made with marsanne or viognier.
As for the variety of weed, in the old days it was hard to be too specific, but now, after legalization, which has made so many different strains available, he has options. He prefers Cherry Pie, a hybrid strain of indica and sativa, the two main species of cannabis. He grows it himself — up to six plants for home use is legal in California — and believes it is predominantly sativa, which is said to produce a more energetic high than indica.
“I’m guessing there’s no regulation of what Cherry Pie is supposed to be,” he said.
Weed wine is delicious, but prohibited commercially, even where cannabis is legal — that hasn’t stopped winemakers from sharing recipes.Weed wine is an underground favorite. Can it survive the gummy era?
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA CENTRO JUDICIAL DE SAN JUAN SALA SUPERIOR BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO
Demandante V. MARCELINO PEREZ HERNANDEZ
Demandado
Civil Núm.: SJ2022CV05849. (604). Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO Y Ejecución de Hipoteca por la Vía Ordinaria. AVISO DE VENTA EN PÚBLICA SUBASTA. Yo, PEDRO HIEYE GONZÁLEZ, Alguacil de la División de Subastas del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de San Juan, a la demandada y al público en general, les notifico que, cumpliendo con un Mandamiento que se ha librado en el presente caso, por el Secretario del Tribunal, con fecha 12 de abril de 2023 y para satisfacer la Sentencia por la cantidad de $129,558.56 de principal; dictada en el caso de epígrafe el 2 de febrero de 2023, notificada y archivada en autos el 9 de febrero de 2023 y publicada mediante edicto el día 14 de febrero de 2023, en el periódico “The San Juan Daily Star”; procederé a vender en pública subasta, al mejor postor en pago de contado y en moneda del curso legal de los Estados Unidos de América, todo derecho, título e interés que haya tenido, tenga o pueda tener la deudora demandada en cuanto a la propiedad localizada en el: Municipio de San Juan, Puerto Rico, los bienes inmuebles se describen a continuación: 1034 Carmen Buzzello St., Ext. Country Club Development, San Juan, PR; 6-EL, Calle 52, Ext. Country Club, San Juan, PR. Descripción:
URBANA: Solar marcado con el número seis (6) del bloque “EL” del plano de inscripción de la Segunda Extensión de la Urbanización Country Club, situado en el Barrio Sabana Llana de la Municipalidad de Río Piedras, San Juan, Puerto Rico, con una cabida superficial de 300.15 metros cuadrados y colinda al NORTE, en 13.05 metros, con la calle #52; al SUR, en 13.05 metros, con ramal Este Highway; al ESTE, en 23.00 metros, con solar #7; y al OESTE, en igual medida con el solar #5. En este solar enclava una casa de concreto reforzado con bloques de concreto para usos residenciales. Finca #6321, inscrita al Folio 141 del Tomo 144 de Sabana
Llana, Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección Quinta (V). Con el importe de dicha venta se habrá de satisfacer a la parte demandante las cantidades adeudadas, según la Sentencia dictada en el caso de epígrafe, por el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de San Juan, cuyas cantidades ascienden a $129,558.56 de principal, 7.5% de intereses, los cuales continúan acumulándose hasta el saldo total de la deuda; $1,234.65 de cargos por demora, los cuales continúan acumulándose hasta el saldo total de la deuda; más costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado. El tipo mínimo para la subasta será la suma de tasación pactada, la cual es $151,800.00 para la propiedad descrita. Si no produjere remate o adjudicación la primera subasta, se procederá a una segunda subasta y servirá de tipo mínimo la cantidad de $101,200.00. Si tampoco hubiere remate ni adjudicación en esta segunda subasta, se procederá a una tercera subasta, en ésta el tipo mínimo será la cantidad de $75,900.00. Si se declarase desierta la tercera subasta se dará por terminado el procedimiento, pudiendo adjudicarse a opción del demandante. Para el lote descrito, la primera subasta se llevará a cabo el día 21 DE JUNIO DE 2023, A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA. De no comparecer postor alguno se llevará a efecto una SEGUNDA SUBASTA el día 28 DE JUNIO DE 2023, A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA. De no comparecer postor alguno se llevará a cabo una TERCERA SUBASTA el día 6 DE JULIO DE 2023, A LAS 10:00 DE LA MAÑANA. La subasta o subastas antes indicadas se llevarán a efecto en mi oficina, localizada en el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala Superior de San Juan. De Estudio de Título realizado no surgen gravámenes preferentes ni posteriores que deban ser cancelados. Se le advierte a los licitadores que la adjudicación se hará al mejor postor, quien deberá consignar el importe de su oferta en el mismo acto de la adjudicación en moneda de curso legal de los Estados Unidos de Norteamérica, giro postal o cheque de gerente a nombre del Alguacil del Tribunal y para conocimiento de la parte demandada y de toda(s) aquella(s) persona(s) que tengan interés inscrito con posterioridad a la inscripción del gravamen que se está ejecutando, y para conocimiento de los licitadores y el público en general y para su publicación
en un periódico de circulación general, una vez por semana durante el término de dos (2) semanas consecutivas con un intervalo de por lo menos siete
(7) días entre ambas publicaciones, y para su fijación en tres
(3) lugares públicos del municipio en que ha de celebrarse la venta, tales como, la Alcaldía, el Tribunal y la Colecturía y se le notificará además a la parte demandada vía correo certificado con acuse de recibo a la última dirección conocida. Se les advierte a todos los interesados que todos los documentos relacionados con la presente acción de ejecución de hipoteca, así como la de la subasta, estarán disponibles para ser examinados en la Secretaría del Tribunal. Se entenderá que todo licitador acepta como bastante la titulación y que las cargas y gravámenes anteriores y los preferentes, si los hubiere al crédito de ejecutante, continuarán subsiguientes entendiéndose que el rematante los acepta y queda subrogado en la responsabilidad de los mismos, sin destinarse a su extinción el precio del remate. La propiedad a ser ejecutada se adquirirá libre de cargas y gravámenes posteriores, previa orden judicial dirigida al Registrador de la Propiedad de la sección correspondiente para la cancelación de aquellos posteriores. Y para conocimiento de la demandada, de los acreedores posteriores, de los licitadores, partes interesadas y público en general, expido el presente Aviso para su publicación en los lugares públicos correspondientes. Librado en San Juan, Puerto Rico, a 15 de mayo de 2023. PEDRO HIEYE GONZÁLEZ, ALGUACIL.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBU-
NAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA
SALA DE SAN JUAN
MTGLQ INVESTORS, L.P.
Parte Demandante Vs. LA SUCESION DE LUIS
ANTONIO CASTRO
FEBO COMPUESTA
POR BENIGNO CASTRO
FEBO, Y POR JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE COMO
POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS; ADMINISTRACIÓN
PARA EL SUSTENTO DE MENORES Y CENTRO DE RECAUDACIÓN DE INGRESOS MUNICIPALES
Parte Demandada
Civil Núm.: SJ2019CV10709.
Sobre: EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA Y COBRO DE DINERO. ANUNCIO DE SUBASTA. El suscribiente, Alguacil del Tribunal de Primera Instancia de Puerto Rico, Sala de San Juan, a los demandados de epígrafe y al público en general hace saber que los autos y documentos del caso de epígrafe estarán de manifiesto en la Secretaría del Tribunal durante horas laborables y que venderá en pública subasta al mejor postor, en moneda de curso legal de los Estados Unidos de América en efectivo, cheque certificado, o giro postal a nombre del Alguacil del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, en mi oficina en este Tribunal el derecho que tenga la parte demandada en el inmueble que se relaciona más adelante para pagar la SENTENCIA por $125,574.48, de balance principal, el cual se compone de un primer principal por la suma de $115,821.00 y un principal diferido por la suma de $9,753.48, mas los intereses sobre la suma de $115,821.00 computados al 5.75% anual desde el día primero de abril de 2017 hasta su total pago; más el 5% computado sobre cada mensualidad por concepto de cargos por demora desde el primero de may de 2016, hasta su total pago; más la suma de $13,200.00 garantizada de la hipoteca para costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado del acreedor demandante, más cualesquiera otras sumas que por cualesquier concepto legal se devenguen hasta el total y completo pago de esta sentencia hasta el día de la subasta.
La propiedad a venderse en pública subasta se describe como sigue: URBANA: Solar marcado con el numero dos
(2) del bloque EV del plano de inscripción de la segunda extensión de la Urbanización Country Club, situado en el Barrio Sabana Llana de Rio Piedras, con una cabida superficial de trescientos punto quince metros cuadrados (300.15).
Colinda por el Norte, en trece punto cero cinco metros (13.05) con la calle numero cincuenta y cinco (55), por el Sur, en trece punto cero cinco metros (13.05) con el solar numero cuarenta y cinco (45), por el Este, en veintitrés metros (23.00) con el solar numero tres (3), y por el Oeste, en veintitrés metros (23.00) con el solar numero uno (1). Enclava una casa de concreto reforzado para vivienda. Sobre la superficie del techo de la vivienda existente antes mencionada, se ha identificado
una segunda planta de concreto y bloques para una familia, según consta de la inscripción décimonovena (19). Inscrita al folio sesenta (60) del tomo ciento sesenta y nueve (169) de Sabana Llana, finca numero siete mil quinientos cuarenta y siete (7,547), Registro de San Juan quinta (5ta). Dirección física: Urbanización Country Club, 1016 Calle Alejo Cruzado, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00924. La PRIMERA SUBASTA se llevará a cabo el día 26 DE JUNIO DE 2023, A LAS 10:30 DE LA MAÑANA, y servirá de tipo mínimo para la misma la suma de $132,000.00 sin admitirse oferta inferior. En el caso de que el inmueble a ser subastado no fuera adjudicado en la primera subasta, se celebrará una SEGUNDA SUBASTA el día 5 DE JULIO DE 2023, A LAS 10:30 DE LA MAÑANA y el precio mínimo para esta segunda subasta será el de dos terceras partes del precio mínimo establecido para la primera subasta, o a sea la suma de $88,000.00. Si tampoco hubiera remate ni adjudicación en la segunda subasta, se celebrará una TERCERA SUBASTA el día 12 DE JULIO DE 2023, A LAS 10:30 DE LA MAÑANA y el tipo mínimo para esta tercera subasta será la mitad del precio establecido para la primera subasta, o sea, la suma de $66,000.00. El mejor postor deberá pagar el importe de su oferta en efecto, cheque certificado o giro postal a nombre del Alguacil del Tribunal. Si se declarase desierta la tercera subasta, se dará por terminado el procedimiento, pudiendo adjudicarse el inmueble al acreedor hipotecario dentro de los diez días siguientes a la fecha de la última subasta, si así lo estimase conveniente, por la totalidad de la cantidad adeudada conforme a la sentencia, si ésta fuera igual o menor que el monto del tipo de la tercera subasta y abonándose dicho monto a la cantidad adeudada si ésta fuera mayor. Se avisa a cualquier licitador que la propiedad queda sujeta al gravamen del Estado Libre Asociado y CRIM sobre la propiedad inmueble por contribuciones adeudadas y que el pago de dichas contribuciones es la responsabilidad del licitador. Que se entenderá por todo licitador acepte como suficiente la titulación y que los cargos y gravámenes anteriores y los preferentes al crédito del ejecutante continuarán subsistentes en entendiéndose que el rematador los acepta y queda subrogado en la res-
ponsabilidad de los mismos, sin destinarse su extinción al precio rematante. Todos los nombres de los acreedores que tengan inscritos o anotados sus derechos sobre los bienes hipotecados con posterioridad a la inscripción del crédito del ejecutante, o de los acreedores de cargas o derechos reales que los hubiesen pospuesto a la hipoteca ejecutada y las personas interesadas en, o con derecho a exigir el cumplimiento de instrumentos negociables garantizados hipotecariamente con posterioridad al crédito ejecutado, siempre que surgen de la certificación registral, para que puedan concurrir a la subasta si les convenga o satisfacer antes del remate el importe del crédito, de sus intereses, costas y honorarios de abogados asegurados, quedando entonces subrogados en los derechos del acreedor ejecutante. La propiedad a ser ejecutada se adquirirá libre de cargas y gravámenes posteriores. Y para conocimiento de licitadores, del público en general y para su publicación en un periódico de circulación general diaria en Puerto Rico y en los sitios públicos de acuerdo a las disposiciones de la Regla 51.7 de las de Procedimiento Civil, así como para la publicación en un periódico de circulación general diaria y en el Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, por espacio de dos semanas con antelación a la fecha de la primera subasta y por lo menos una vez por semana. Los autos y todos los documentos correspondientes al procedimiento indicado estarán de manifiesto en la Secretaría del Tribunal durante las horas laborables. (Art. 102 (1) de la Ley núm. 2102015). Expedido el presente en San Juan, Puerto Rico a 18 de mayo de 2023. PEDRO HIEYE
GONZÁLEZ, ALGUACIL DEL TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA, SALA DE SAN JUAN.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA
SALA SUPERIOR DE SAN JUAN
REVERSE MORTGAGE FUNDING LLC
Demandante Vs. SUCESION NICOLAS
RODRIGUEZ SURILLO
T/C/C NICOLAS ANTOLIN
RODRIGUEZ SURILLO
T/C/C NICOLAS A.
RODRIGUEZ SURILLO
T/C/C NICOLAS A.
RODRIGUEZ T/C/C
NICOLAS RODRIGUEZ COMPUESTA POR JOHN
DOE Y JANE DOE COMO
POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS; SUCESION ADELAIDA
BATISTA ORTIZ T/C/C
ANA LAIDA BATISTA
ORTIZ T/C/C ADELAIDA
BATISTA COMPUESTA
POR JOHN ROE Y JANE ROE COMO
POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA; CENTRO DE RECAUDACION DE INGRESOS MUNICIPALES
Demandados
Civil Núm.: SJ2022CV01974. Sobre: EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. EDICTO DE SUBASTA. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS.
A: LA PARTE DEMANDADA, AL (A LA) SECRETARIO(A) DE HACIENDA DE PUERTO RICO Y AL PÚBLICO
GENERAL:
Certifico y Hago Constar: Que en cumplimiento con el Mandamiento de Ejecución de Sentencia que me ha sido dirigido por el (la) Secretario(a) del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala Superior de San Juan, en el caso de epígrafe, venderé en pública subasta y al mejor postor, por separado, de contado y por moneda de curso legal de los Estados Unidos de América y/o Giro Postal y Cheque Certificado, en mi oficina ubicada en el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de San Juan, el 26 DE JUNIO DE 2023, A LAS 9:00 DE LA MAÑANA, todo derecho título, participación o interés que le corresponda a la parte demandada o cualquiera de ellos en el inmueble hipotecado objeto de ejecución que se describe a continuación: URBANA: PROPIEDAD HORIZONTAL: Apartamento residencial localizado en el piso número cinco del Edificio Torres Sur del inmueble sometido al Régimen de Propiedad Horizontal denominado Condominio Parque de Loyola que ubica en el barrio Hato Rey del Municipio de San Juan, Puerto Rico. Apartamento: 508. Este Apartamento tiene un área de construcción de 1594.00 pies cuadrados equivalentes a 148.09 metros cuadrados, distribuidos en 1405.24 pies cuadrados equivalentes a 130.55 metros cuadrados de área cu-
bierta y 188.76 pies cuadrados equivalentes a 17.54 metros cuadrados de área descubierta. Este Apartamento tiene su puerta de entrada por el lindero ESTE, y por ella se sale al pasillo que conduce al área de ascensores y escaleras y de ahí se sale al exterior. Este Apartamento tiene un largo máximo de 52 pies 2 pulgadas y un ancho máximo de 34 pies 5 pulgadas. En lindes por el NORTE, en 26 pies 11 pulgadas con el área común exterior y la pared medianera que lo separa del Apartamento 501, por el SUR, en 34 pies 5 pulgadas con la pared medianera que lo separa del Apartamento 507, por el ESTE, en 52 pies 2 pulgadas con área común y el pasillo que conduce al Apartamento, por el OESTE, en 52 pies 2 pulgadas con el área común exterior. Este Apartamento consta de tres dormitorios uno de ellos (master), dos baños uno de ellos (master) con closet vestidor, dos closets, un pasillo con closet, laundry, cocina, sala, comedor y terraza. ESTACIONAMIENTO: Se le asigna a este Apartamento para su uso exclusivo e irrevocable dos espacios de estacionamientos para automóviles, siendo los espacios aquellos marcados con los números 454 y 455. Dichos espacios de estacionamiento constituyen parte de los elementos comunes limitados de los Apartamentos (en adelante denominado como el Apartamento). El por ciento que le corresponde a dicha unidad en los gastos de los elementos comunes limitados de la Torre Sur es de 1.0625%. El porciento que le corresponde en los gastos comunes generales y de ganancias del Condominio y para fines de votación hasta la fecha en que se obtenga el permiso de uso para la Torres Norte es de 0.96942% y a partir de dicha fecha será de 0.40555%. Finca número 38,860, inscrita al folio 1 del tomo 1433 de Rio Piedras Norte, Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección II. La Hipoteca Revertida consta inscrita al folio 20 vto. del tomo 1481 de Rio Piedras Norte, Finca 38,860, Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección II, inscripción 10ª. Propiedad localizada en: 500 AVE. PINERO, APTO. #508 COND. PARQUE DE LOYOLA, SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO 00918. Según figuran en la certificación registral, la propiedad objeto de ejecución está gravada por las siguientes cargas anteriores o preferentes: Nombre del Titular: N/A. Suma de la Carga: N/A. Fecha de Vencimiento:
N/A. Según figuran en la certificación registral, la propiedad objeto de ejecución está gravada por las siguientes cargas posteriores a la inscripción del crédito ejecutante: Nombre del Titular: Secretario de la Vivienda y Desarrollo Urbano. Suma de la Carga: $570,000.00. Fecha de Vencimiento: 1 de febrero de 2077. Nombre del Titular: Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Suma de la Carga: $11,090.55. Fecha de Anotación: 11 de julio de 2019. Notificación: 359146719. Se entenderá que todo licitador acepta como bastante la titularidad de la propiedad y que todas las cargas y gravámenes anteriores y los preferentes al crédito ejecutante antes descritos, si los hubiere, continuarán subsistentes.
El rematante acepta dichas cargas y gravámenes anteriores, y queda subrogado en la responsabilidad de los mismos, sin destinarse a su extinción el precio del remate. Se establece como tipo de mínima subasta la suma de $380,000.00, según acordado entre las partes en el precio pactado en la escritura de hipoteca. De ser necesaria una SEGUNDA SUBASTA por declararse desierta la primera, la misma se celebrará en mi oficina, ubicada en el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de San Juan, el 5 DE JULIO DE 2023,
A LAS 9:00 DE LA MAÑANA, y se establece como mínima para dicha segunda subasta la suma de $253,333.33, 2/3 partes del tipo mínima establecido originalmente. Si tampoco se produce remate ni adjudicación en la segunda subasta, se establece como mínima para la TERCERA SUBASTA, la suma de $190,000.00, la mitad (1/2) del precio pactado y dicha subasta se celebrará en mi oficina, ubicada en el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de San Juan, el 12 DE JULIO DE 2023, A LAS
9:00 DE LA MAÑANA. Dicha subasta se llevará a cabo para, con su producto satisfacer a la parte demandante, el importe de la Sentencia dictada a su favor ascendente a la suma de $389,939.00 por concepto de principal, la cual no incluye intereses y otros gastos acumulados hasta el 31 de marzo de 2022. La suma global vencida, líquida y exigible incluyendo intereses y otros gastos acumulados hasta el 31 de marzo de 2022 es de $462,112.91 y los cuales continúan acumulándose, así como la cantidad líquida estipulada en los documentos del préstamo para costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado en caso de reclamación judicial y que correspondan a intereses y cargos por demora posterior a dicha fecha; así como cualquier otra suma que se haga en virtud de la escritura de hipoteca.
Dichas sumas están vencidas, son líquidas y exigibles. La venta en pública subasta de la referida propiedad se verificará libre de toda carga o gravamen posterior que afecte la mencionada finca, a cuyo efecto se notifica y se hace saber la fecha, hora y sitio de la PRIMERA, SEGUNDA Y TERCERA SUBASTA, si esto fuera necesario, a los efectos de que cualquier persona o personas con algún interés puedan comparecer a la celebración de dicha subasta. Se notifica a todos los interesados que las actas y demás constancias del expediente de este caso están disponibles en la Secretaría del Tribunal durante horas laborables para ser examinadas por los (las) interesados (as). Y para su publicación en el periódico The San Juan Daily Star, que es un diario de circulación general en la isla de Puerto Rico, por espacio de dos semanas consecutivas con un intervalo de por lo menos siete (7) días entre ambas publicaciones, así como para su publicación en los sitios públicos de Puerto Rico. Expedido en San Juan, Puerto Rico, hoy 15 de mayo de 2023. PEDRO HIEYE GONZÁLEZ, ALGUACIL REGIONAL.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE COMERÍO ISLAND PORTFOLIO SERVICES, LLC, COMO AGENTE DE FAIRWAY ACQUISITIONS FUND, LLC
Demandante Vs. ERICK J. RIVERA COLÓN
Demandado
Civil Núm.: BQ2022CV00086.
Salón: 001. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO ORDINARIO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO.
ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS.
A: ERICK J. RIVERA COLÓN115 CALLE BARCELÓ
BARRANQUITAS, PR 00794-1605 / HC 3 BOX 7523 BARRANQUITAS, PR 00794 / HC 2 BOX 11508
BARRANQUITAS, PR 00794.
POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza y requiere para que conteste la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días siguientes a la publicación de este Edicto. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), la cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente direc-
ción electrónica: https://unired. ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda o cualquier otro sin más citarle ni oírle, si el tribunal en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente. El sistema SUMAC notificará copia a los abogados de la parte demandante, el Ledo. Kevin Sánchez Campanero cuyas direcciones son: P.O. Box 71418 San Juan, Puerto Rico 009368518, teléfono (787) 993-3731 a la dirección kevin.sanchez@ orf-law.com, y a la dirección notificaciones@orf-law.com. EX-
TENDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en Comerío, Puerto Rico, hoy día 25 de abril de 2023. ELIZABETH GONZÁLEZ RIVERA, SECRETARIA.
CARMEN J. APONTE MERCADO, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL
GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE PONCE ORIENTAL BANK
Demandante V. MARIA ELENA SANCHEZ ARIAS, MARELIZ DE JESÚS RODRÍGUEZ Y GEOVANNI DE JESÚS RODRÍGUEZ COMO MIEMBROS CONOCIDOS DE LA SUCESIÓN DE HIPÓLITO DE JESÚS FLORES; JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE COMO MIEMBROS DESCONOCIDOS DE LA SUCESIÓN DE HIPÓLITO DE JESÚS FLORES Demandados
Civil Núm.: GM2023CV00015.
Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO, EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA E INTERPELACIÓN. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU., EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE P.R., SS. EDICTO.
A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE como miembros desconocidos de Ia Sucesión de Hipólito De Jesus Flores.
Brisas del Prado 2103 Calle Zorzal, Santa Isabel, PR 00757; Urb. Brisas Del Prado, H-35 Calle Zorzal, Santa Isabel, PR 00757; Urb. Brisas Del Prado, Lot
H-35 Calle Zorsal (307), Santa Isabel, PR 00757; Solar H-35 Urb. Brisas del Prado (Valle Costero III) Barrio Felicia Dos, Santa Isabel, PR 00757; 500 Saraina Rd, PMB 218, Shelbyville, IN 45176.
POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al tribunal su alegación responsiva dentro de los 30 días de haber sido diligenciado este emplazamiento, excluyéndose el día del diligenciamiento. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired.ramajudicial. pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente. Representa a la parte demandante el Lcdo. Javier Montalvo Cintrón, Delgado & Fernández, LLC, PO Box 11750, Fernández Juncos Station, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00910-1750. Tel. [787] 2741414. DADA en Pon ce, Puerto Rico, a 28 de abril de 2023. CARMEN G. TIRÚ QUIÑONES, SECRETARIA REGIONAL. EREINA AGRONT LEÓN, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR DEL TRIBUNAL.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE SAN JUAN ISLAND PORTFOLIO SERVICES, LLC., COMO AGENTE DE FAIRWAY ACQUISITIONS FUND, LLC.
Demandante V. EDUARDO A. MANGLES BUENO
Demandado(a)
Civil: SJ2022CV04636. 807.
Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. A: EDUARDO A. MANGLES BUENO.
(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 22 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debi-
damente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 24 de mayo de 2023. En San Juan, Puerto Rico, el 24 de mayo de 2023. GRISELDA RODRÍGUEZ COLLADO, SECRETARIA. VIRGEN Y. DEL VALLE DÍAZ, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE FAJARDO ISLAND PORTFOLIO SERVICES, LLC. COMO AGENTE DE FAIRWAY ACQUISITIONS FUND LLC
Demandante V. RICHARD L PEREZ COLON
Demandado(a)
Civil: RG2023CV00572. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO - REGLA 60. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.
A: RICHARD L. PEREZ COLON, URB RIO GRANDE ESTATES, S-23 CALLE 12, RIO GRANDE PR 00745. (Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 23 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a
partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 25 de mayo de 2023. En Fajardo, Puerto Rico, el 25 de mayo de 2023. WANDA SEGUÍ REYES, SECRETARIA REGIONAL. LINDA I. MEDINA MEDINA, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DEL PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA SALA SUPERIOR DE CAGUAS ISLAND PORTFOLIO SERVICES, LLC COMO AGENTE DE FAIRWAY ACQUISITIONS FUND LLC
Demandante Vs. JENNIFER DIAZ TORRES
Demandado(a)
Civil Núm. JU2022CV00155.
Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO ORDINARIO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. A: JENNIFER DIAZ TORRES. URB. JARDINES DE BARCELONA A-3 CALLE 6, JUNCOS, P.R. 00777-3709. (Nombre de las partes a las que se les notifica la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 19 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 26 de mayo de 2023. En Caguas, Puerto Rico, el 26 de mayo de 2023.. LISILDA MARTÍNEZ AGOSTO, SECRETARIA. VIONNETTE ESPINOSA CASTILLO, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA SALA
MUNICIPAL DE CAGUAS PR RECOVERY AND DEVELOPMENT JV, LLC
Demandante V. ROXANNA GONZALEZ SANTIAGO, JOSE M. CRUZ & LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS
Demandado(a)
Civil: CG2022CV01771. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO, INCUMPLIMIENTO DE CONTRATO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.
A: ROXANNA GONZALEZ SANTIAGO, POR SI Y EN REPRESENTACION DE LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALESBONNEVILLE HEIGHTS, #99 CALLE CAYEY, CAGUAS, PR 00725 / 620
E 110TH TER, KANSAS CITY, MO 64131.
(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 11 de abril de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 25 de mayo de 2023. En Caguas, Puerto Rico, el 25 de mayo de 2023. LISILDA MARTÍNEZ AGOSTO, SECRETARIA. SANDRA J. TRINIDAD CAÑUELAS, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA
SALA SUPERIOR PONCE
ADA HILDA
BATISTA FLORES
Demandante V.
FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE CORPORATION (FDIC), POR CONDUCTO
DE SUCESORES EN DERECHO DE R&G MORTGAGE CORPORATION, JUAN DEL PUEBLO Y JUANA DEL PUEBLO Y CUALESQUIERA PERSONA DESCONOCIDA CON POSIBLE INTERÉS EN LA OBLIGACIÓN CUYA CANCELACIÓN POR DECRETO JUDICIAL SE SOLICITA
Demandados Civil Núm.: PO2023CV01517. Sobre: CANCELACIÓN DE PAGARÉ EXTRAVIADO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU., ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS.
A: JUAN Y JUANA DEL PUEBLO.
Por la presente se le notifica que ha sido presentada en este Tribunal una Demanda en su contra en el pleito de epígrafe. En este caso la parte demandante ha radicado una Demanda para que se decrete judicialmente el saldo de (1) pagaré hipotecario: pagaré a favor R&G MORTGAGE CORPORATION, por la suma principal de $18,000.00 dólares intereses al 6.5/8% anual y vencedero el día 1 de mayo de 2022, constituida mediante la escritura número 139, otorgada en Ponce, Puerto Rico, el día 28 de abril de 2005, ante el notario Omar notario Omar Ivan Arill Vizcarrondo, e inscrita al folio 216 del tomo 2035 de Ponce Norte, finca número 25,313 inscripción 12ma; sobre la propiedad que se describe a continuación: URBANA: Solar en la URBANIZACIÓN GLENVIEW GARDENS, SECCION II del Barrio MACHUELO ARRIBA de PONCE, Puerto Rico, marcado con el número N-7, con una cabida de 312.00 metros cuadrados. Colindando por el NORTE, en 13.00 metros, con el paseo público; por el SUR, en 13.00 metros, con la Calle E-9; por el ESTE, en 24.00 metros, con el solar número (8); y por el OESTE, en 24.00 metros, con el solar número (6). --- Contiene una casa de concreto tipo Imperial, de tres (3) dormitorios, sala, comedor, cocina, dos (2) baños, balcón y marquesina. Finca Número 25,313, inscrita al folio 147 del tomo 939 de Ponce Norte, Registro de la Propiedad de Puerto Rico, Sección I de Ponce. La parte demandante alega que dicho pagaré ha sido saldado según más detalladamente consta en la Demanda radicada que puede examinarse en la Secretaría de este Tribunal. Por tratarse de una
obligación hipotecaria y pudiendo usted tener interés en este caso o quedar afectado por el remedio solicitado, se le emplaza por este edicto que se publicará una vez en un periódico de circulación diaria general de Puerto Rico. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https:// unired.ramajudicial.pr/sumac, salvo que se represente por derecho propio. Debe notificar con copia de ella a la abogada de la parte demandante a la Lcda.
Alyssa Rivera Rivera, a la dirección P.O. Box 19815, San Juan, P.R. 00910. Teléfono 787-4007269, dentro de los treinta (30) días siguientes a la publicación de este Edicto. Se le apercibe que, de no hacerlo así dentro del término indicado, el Tribunal podrá anotar su rebeldía y dictar sentencia concediendo el remedio solicitado en la Demanda sin más citarle, ni oírle. EXTENDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA Y SELLO DEL TRIBUNAL, en Ponce, Puerto Rico, hoy a 23 de mayo de 2023. CARMEN
G. TIRÚ QUIÑONES, SECRETARIA. JESSICA BONILLA RODRÍGUEZ, SUB-SECRETARIA.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBU-
NAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA
SALA DE TOA BAJA
JOSHUA BRUNO
MORALES Y SU ESPOSA CORALYS NIEVES TORRES Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS
Demandante Vs. BANCO POPULAR PUERTO RICO
COMO SUCESOR EN DERECHOS DE LEVITT MORTGAGE CORPORATION; ORIENTAL BANK COMO SUCESOR EN DERECHOS DE EUROBANK; FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE CORPORATION
COMO SUCESOR EN DERECHOS DE RG MORTGAGE CORPORATION; JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE COMO POSIBLES TENEDORES CON INTERÉS
Demandados
Civil Núm.: TB2023CV00176.
Sobre: CANCELACIÓN DE PAGARÉ HIPOTECARIO EXTRA-
VIADO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO.
A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD
ROE (PERSONAS DESCONOCIDAS CON POSIBLE INTERÉS).
En este caso la parte demandante ha radicado Demanda para que se decrete judicialmente el saldo de un pagare a favor de LEVITT MORTGAGE CORPORATION o a su orden por la suma de $141,649.00 intereses al 6 3/4% anual y fecha de vencimiento al 1 de mayo de 2029, constituido mediante la escritura 172 otorgada en San Juan, Puerto Rico el 28 de abril de 1999 ante el Notario Público Estela E. Valle Acosta inscripción 1era., Registro de la Propiedad Sección Segunda de Bayamón, y está garantizado por hipoteca sobre la propiedad sita en Solar 94 del Bloque MM Urbanizacion Masion del Mar
Toa Baja, Puerto Rico que se describe como sigue: URBANA: Parcela de terreno identificada como Solar noventa y cuatro (94) del Bloque MM de la Urbanización Mansión del Mar, radicada en el Barrio Sabana Seca del término municipal de Toa Baja, Puerto Rico con una cabida de doscientos noventa y tres punto setecientos cincuenta (293.750) metros cuadrados y en lindes por el NORTE: en doce punto cincuenta (12.50) metros con los Solares número ochenta y uno (81) y ochenta y dos (82); por el SUR: en doce punto cincuenta (12.50) metros con la Calle número dos (2) (Calle Pelicano); por el ESTE: en veintitrés punto cincuenta (23.50) metros con el Solar número noventa y tres (93); y por el OESTE: en veinticuatro punto cincuenta (23.50) metros con el Solar número noventa y cinco (95). En dicho solar enclava una casa de concreto diseñada para una familia. Inscrita al folio 240 del tomo 488 de Toa Baja, finca número 26,864 Bis, Registro de la Propiedad de Bayamón, Sección Segunda. La parte demandante alega que dicho Pagaré se ha extraviado, según más detalladamente consta en la Demanda radicada que puede examinarse en la Secretaría de este Tribunal. Por tratarse de una obligación hipotecaria, y pudiendo usted tener interés en este caso o quedar afectado por el remedio solicitado, se les emplaza por este Edicto que se publicará en un (1) periódico de circulación general una (1) sola vez y que si no comparecen a contestar dicha Demanda radicando el original de la misma a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual pueden acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired.ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se representen por
derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberán presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala de Utuado, con copia al abogado de la parte demandante, Lcdo. Jorge García Rondón, de PMB 538, 267 Sierra Morena, San Juan, Puerto Rico 00926 dentro del término de treinta (30) días contados a partir de la publicación del Edicto, se les anotará la rebeldía y se dictará sentencia en su contra concediendo el remedio solicitado en la Demanda sin más citarles ni oírles. EN TESTIMONIO DE LO CUAL, expido el presente Edicto por Orden del Tribunal, bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal, en Toa Baja, Puerto Rico, hoy 25 de mayo de 2023. LCDA. LAURA I. SANTA
SÁNCHEZ, SECRETARIA REGIONAL. LUISA I. ANDINO
AYALA, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR DEL TRIBUNAL.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA
TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE VEGA BAJA
ORIENTAL BANK
Demandante V.
JESUS R. ORTEGA
TORRES, FULANA DE TAL Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES
COMPUESTA POR AMBOS DEMANDADOS
Demandado(a)
Civil: VB2022CV00793. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO VÍA ORDINARIA. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.
A: JESUS R. ORTEGA TORRES, FULANA DE TAL Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR
AMBOS DEMANDADOS.
(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 26 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a
partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 26 de mayo de 2023. En Vega Baja, Puerto Rico, el 26 de mayo de 2023. LCDA LAURA I. SANTA SÁNCHEZ, SECRETARIA. MARITZA ROSARIO ROSARIO, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE VEGA BAJA VACATION OWNERSHIP LENDING, L.P. Demandante V. JORGE RIVERA RIVERA, NANCY DELGADO ROSARIO Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES, COMPUESTA POR AMBOS
Demandado(a)
Civil: VB2023CV00004. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO, EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.
A: JORGE RIVERA RIVERA, POR SÍ Y EN REPRESENTACIÓN DE LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES NANCY DELGADO ROSARIO, POR SÍ Y EN REPRESENTACIÓN DE LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES, COMPUESTA POR AMBOS.
(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 26 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a
usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 26 de mayo de 2023. En Vega Baja, Puerto Rico, el 26 de mayo de 2023. LCDA. LAURA I. SANTA SÁNCHEZ, SECRETARIA. MARITZA ROSARIO ROSARIO, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE CAROLINA ORIENTAL BANK
Demandante V. SUCESIÓN DE FÉLIX RAMÓN MULERO
MERCADO COMPUESTA
POR FULANO Y FULANA DE TAL, CENTRO DE RECAUDACIONES DE INGRESOS MUNICIPALES, DEPARTAMENTO DE HACIENDA
Demandado(a)
Civil: CA2023CV00407. 407. Sobre: INTERPELACIÓN, COBRO DE DINERO Y EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.
A: SUCESIÓN DE FELIX RAMÓN MULERO MERCADO COMPUESTA
POR FULANO Y FULANA DE TAL. (Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 16 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 26 de mayo de 2023. En Carolina, Puerto Rico, el 26 de mayo de 2023. MARILYN APONTE RO-
DRÍGUEZ, SECRETARIA. KEILA GARCÍA SOLÍS, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
LEGAL NOTICE
-ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA
TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE CAROLINA
ORIENTAL BANK
COMO AGENTE DE SERVICIO DE THE MONEY HOUSE INC
Demandante V. LEONARDO MORALES
PRIETO (DEUDOR HIPOTECARIO), LOURDES ORTIZ EN LA CUOTA VIUDAL USUFRUCTUARIA DE LA SUCESIÓN DE GABRIEL MORALES
FIGUEROA COMPUESTA
POR AZYRIS MORALES, GABRIEL MORALES, VICTORIA MORALES (MENORES DE EDAD)
FULANO Y FULANA DE TAL COMO
POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS DE LA SUCESIÓN, CENTRO DE RECAUDACIÓN DE INGRESOS MUNICIPALES (CRIM)
Demandado(a)
Civil: CA2022CV00373. 407. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO Y EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA (VÍA ORDINARIA). NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.
A: LA PARTE CODEMANDADA LEONARDO MORALES PRIETO (DEUDOR HIPOTECARIO), FULANO Y FULANA DE TAL COMO POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS DE LA SUCESIÓN DE GABRIEL MORALES FIGUEROA. (Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 30 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del
término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 30 de mayo de 2023. En Carolina, Puerto Rico, el 30 de mayo de 2023. MARILYN APONTE RODRÍGUEZ, SECRETARIA. KEILA GARCÍA SOLÍS, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA
SALA SUPERIOR DE BAYAMÓN
WILMINGTON SAVINGS
FUND SOCIETY, FSB, NOT INDIVIDUALLY BUT SOLELY AS TRUSTEE FOR FINANCE OF AMERICA STRUCTURED SECURITIES
ACQUISITION TRUST
2018-HB1
Demandante Vs. SUCESION ANGEL
DAVID MALDONADO
PEREZ T/C/C ANGEL
D. MALDONADO
PEREZ T/C/C ANGEL
MALDONADO
PEREZ T/C/C ANGEL
DAVID MALDONADO
T/C/C ANGEL D. MALDONADO T/C/C
ANGEL MALDONADO COMPUESTA POR
MELISA MALDONADO REYES, MARITZA
MALDONADO REYES; JOHN DOE Y JANE DOE COMO
POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS; JOSEFINA REYES DE LA PAZ T/C/C JOSEFINA REYES POR SÍ Y EN LA CUOTA VIUDAL USUFRUCTUARIA; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA; CENTRO DE RECAUDACION DE INGRESOS MUNICIPALES
Demandados
Civil Núm.: BY2023CV02190.
Sobre: EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO
RICO, SS.
A: MELISA MALDONADO REYES, MARITZA MALDONADO REYES; JOHN DOE Y JANE DOE COMO
POSIBLES MIEMBROS
DAVID MALDONADO
PEREZ T/C/C ANGEL D. MALDONADO
PEREZ T/C/C ANGEL
MALDONADO PEREZ
T/C/C ANGEL DAVID
MALDONADO T/C/C
ANGEL D. MALDONADO T/C/C ANGEL
MALDONADO.
POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al Tribunal su alegación responsiva a la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación de este edicto. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: http://unired. ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberé presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaria del tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente. Greenspoon Marder, LLP
Lcda. Frances L. Asencio-Guido R.U.A. 15,622 TRADE CENTRE SOUTH, SUITE 700 100 WEST CYPRESS CREEK ROAD FORT LAUDERDALE, FL 33309 Telephone: (954) 343 6273 Frances.Asencio@gmlaw.com Expedido bajo mi firma, y sello del Tribunal, en Bayamón, Puerto Rico, hoy día 23 de mayo de 2023. LCDA. LAURA I. SANTA SÁNCHEZ, SECRETARIA REGIONAL. VERÓNICA RIVERA RODRÍGUEZ, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR DEL TRIBUNAL I.
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE CAGUAS
COMPU-LINK
CORPORATION D/B/A
CELINK
Demandante Vs. SUCESION AIDA CINTRON MALDONADO COMPUESTA POR JOHN DOE Y JANE DOE COMO POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA; CENTRO DE RECAUDACION DE INGRESOS MUNICIPALES Demandados Civil Núm.: CG2023CV00831. Sobre: EJECUCIÓN DE HI-
POTECA. EMPLAZAMIENTO
POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS.
A: JOHN DOE Y JANE DOE COMO POSIBLES MIEMBROS DESCONOCIDOS DE LA SUCESION AIDA CINTRON MALDONADO.
POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al Tribunal su alegación responsiva a la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación de este edicto.
Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: http://unired.
ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberé presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaria del tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente.
Greenspoon Marder, LLP
Lcda. Frances L. Asencio-Guido
R.U.A. 15,622
TRADE CENTRE SOUTH, SUITE 700
100 WEST CYPRESS CREEK ROAD FORT LAUDERDALE, FL 33309
Telephone: (954) 343 6273
Frances.Asencio@gmlaw.corn
Expedido bajo mi firma, y sello del Tribunal, en Caguas, Puerto Rico, hoy día 23 de mayo de 2023. LISILDA MARTÍNEZ AGOSTO, SECRETARIA.
VIONNETTE ESPINOSA CASTILLO, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBU-
NAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA
CENTRO JUDICIAL DE HATILLO SALA SUPERIOR.
BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO
Demandante V.
ELMO MANUEL ROMAN
RODRIGUEZ T/C/C
ELMO M. ROMAN
RODRIGUEZ, WILNELIA
MICHEL PAGAN PEREZ
T/C/C WILNELIA M.
PAGAN PEREZ Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES
COMPUESTA POR
AMBOS
Demandados
CIVIL NUM. CFCD2011-0100.
SOBRE: COBRO DE DINERO Y EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA
POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA. AVISO DE VENTA EN PÚBLICA SUBASTA. Yo, Luis E Roman Carrero, Alguacil de la División de Subastas del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de Camuy, a la demandada y al público en general, les notifico que, cumpliendo con un Mandamiento que se ha librado en el presente caso, por el Secretario del Tribunal, con fecha 18 de abril de 2023 y para satisfacer la Sentencia por la cantidad de $115,540.00 de principal; dictada en el caso de epígrafe el 6 de junio de 2013, notificada y archivada en autos el 18 de junio de 2013 y publicada mediante edicto el día 27 de junio de 2013, en el periódico Primera Hora; procederé a vender en pública subasta, al mejor postor en pago de contado y en moneda del curso legal de los Estados Unidos de América, todo derecho, título e interés que haya tenido, tenga o pueda tener la deudora demandada en cuanto a la propiedad localizada en el: Municipio de Hatillo, Puerto Rico, los bienes inmuebles se describen a continuación: 16 Estancias de Carrizales Dev., Hatillo, PR 00659.
URBANA: Solar marcado con el número Dieciséis (16) de ESTANCIAS DE CARRIZALES, del término municipal de Hatillo, Puerto Rico, con una cabida superficial de Cuatrocientos Setenta y Uno punto Cero Catorce metros cuadrados (471.014 m.c.), colindando por el NORTE, con el Lote número Quince (15) con una distancia de Veinticuatro punto Cuarenta y Seis metros (24.46 m), por el SUR colindando con el Lote número Diecisiete (17), con una distancia de Veintidós punto Noventa y Cuatro metros (22.94), por el ESTE, con la calle “A” en Diecinueve punto Ochenta y Siete metros (19.87 m) y por el OESTE colindando con un uso público en una distancia en Diecinueve punto Noventa y Tres metros (19.93 m). Enclava una estructura para fines residenciales diseñada para vivienda de una sola familia, construida conforme a Planos y Especificaciones aprobada por las agencias e instrumentalidades gubernamentales pertinentes. Finca #26249 de Hatillo inscrita al tomo Karibe. Registro de la Propiedad de Arecibo, Sección II. Con el importe de dicha venta se habrá de satisfacer a la parte demandante las cantidades adeudadas, según la Sentencia dictada en el caso de epígrafe, por el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de Hatillo, cuyas cantidades ascienden a $115,540.00 de principal, $3,014.00 de intereses, los cuales continúan acumulándose hasta el saldo total de la deuda; $132.48 de gastos
por mora, los cuales continúan acumulándose hasta el pago total de la deuda, $13,100.00 para honorarios de abogado, más costas y gastos del pleito. El tipo mínimo para la subasta será la suma de tasación pactada, la cual es $131,000.00 para la propiedad descrita. Si no produjere remate o adjudicación la primera subasta, se procederá a una segunda subasta y servirá de tipo mínimo la cantidad de $87,333.33. Si tampoco hubiere remate ni adjudicación en esta segunda subasta, se procederá a una tercera subasta, en ésta el tipo mínimo será la cantidad de $65,500.00. Si se declarase desierta la tercera subasta se dará por terminado el procedimiento, pudiendo adjudicarse a opción del demandante. Para el lote descrito, la primera subasta se llevará a cabo el día 6 de julio de 2023, a las 9:30 de la mañana. De no comparecer postor alguno se llevará a efecto una segunda subasta el día 13 de julio de 2023, a las 9:30 de la mañana. De no comparecer postor alguno se llevará a cabo una tercera subasta el día 20 de julio de 2023, a las 9:30 de la mañana. La subasta o subastas antes indicadas se llevarán a efecto en mi oficina, localizada en el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala Superior de Camuy. De Estudio de Título realizado no surgen gravámenes preferentes ni posteriores que deban ser cancelados. Se le advierte a los licitadores que la adjudicación se hará al mejor postor, quien deberá consignar el importe de su oferta en el mismo acto de la adjudicación en moneda de curso legal de los Estados Unidos de Norteamérica, giro postal o cheque de gerente a nombre del Alguacil del Tribunal y para conocimiento de la parte demandada y de toda(s) aquella(s) persona(s) que tengan interés inscrito con posterioridad a la inscripción del gravamen que se está ejecutando, y para conocimiento de los licitadores y el público en general y para su publicación en un periódico de circulación general, una vez por semana durante el término de dos (2) semanas consecutivas con un intervalo de por lo menos siete (7) días entre ambas publicaciones, y para su fijación en tres (3) lugares públicos del municipio en que ha de celebrarse la venta, tales como, la Alcaldía, el Tribunal y la Colecturía y se le notificará además a la parte demandada vía correo certificado con acuse de recibo a la última dirección conocida. Se les advierte a todos los interesados que todos los documentos relacionados con la presente acción de ejecución de hipoteca, así como la de la subasta,
estarán disponibles para ser examinados en la Secretaría del Tribunal. Se entenderá que todo licitador acepta como bastante la titulación y que las cargas y gravámenes anteriores y los preferentes, si los hubiere al crédito de ejecutante, continuarán subsiguientes entendiéndose que el rematante los acepta y queda subrogado en la responsabilidad de los mismos, sin destinarse a su extinción el precio del remate. La propiedad a ser ejecutada se adquirirá libre de cargas y gravámenes posteriores, previa orden judicial dirigida al Registrador de la Propiedad de la sección correspondiente para la cancelación de aquellos posteriores. Y para conocimiento de la demandada, de los acreedores posteriores, de los licitadores, partes interesadas y público en general, expido el presente Aviso para su publicación en los lugares públicos correspondientes. Librado en Camuy, Puerto Rico, a 23 de mayo de 2023. Luis E Roman Carrero, ALGUACIL. Wilfredo Olmo Salazar, Alguacil Regional.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE BAYAMÓN CARLOS ALBERTO OTERO
Demandante V. ADMINISTRACION DE VETERANOS, JOHN DOE; RICHARD ROE, PERSONAS DESCONOCIDAS CON POSIBLE CANCELACION DE PAGARE INTERÉS
Demandado(a)
Civil: BY20230V01005. Sala: 701. Sobre: CANCELACIÓN DE PAGARÉ EXTRAVIADO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.
A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE, COMO POSIBLES TENEDORES DEL PAGARÉ.
(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 26 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sen-
tencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 30 de mayo de 2023. En BAYAMÓN, Puerto Rico, el 30 de mayo de 2023. LCDA LAURA I. SANTA SÁNCHEZ, SECRETARIA. VERÓNICA RIVERA RODRÍGUEZ, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA
TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE SAN JUAN BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO
Parte Demandante Vs. SUCESIÓN DE RAMÓN LUIS NIEVES MARCANO T/C/C LUIS NIEVES MARCANO COMPUESTA
POR SU HEREDERA
CONOCIDA INÉS NIEVES; FULANO(A) DE TAL Y SUTANO(A) DE TAL COMO MIEMBROS DESCONOCIDOS Y/O PARTES CON INTERÉS EN DICHA SUCESIÓN; SUCESIÓN DE ELVIA ALONSO DE NIEVES T/C/C ELVIA ALONSO NIEVES Y COMO ELVIA ALONSO COMPUESTA POR SU HEREDERA CONOCIDA INÉS NIEVES; MENGANITO(A) DE TAL Y SUTANITO(A) DE TAL COMO MIEMBROS DESCONOCIDOS Y/O PARTES CON INTERÉS EN DICHA SUCESIÓN; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA; CENTRO DE RECAUDACIÓN DE INGRESOS MUNICIPALES (CRIM); DEPARTAMENTO DE HACIENDA
Parte Demandada Civil Núm.: SJ2021CV06776. (604). Sobre: EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.
A: SUCESIÓN DE RAMÓN LUIS NIEVES MARCANO T/C/C LUIS NIEVES MARCANO COMPUESTA POR SU HEREDERA CONOCIDA INÉS NIEVES; FULANO(A) DE TAL Y SUTANO(A) DE TAL COMO MIEMBROS DESCONOCIDOS Y/O
ALONSO DE NIEVES
T/C/C ELVIA ALONSO NIEVES Y COMO ELVIA ALONSO COMPUESTA POR SU HEREDERA CONOCIDA INÉS NIEVES; MENGANITO(A) DE TAL Y SUTANITO(A) DE TAL COMO MIEMBROS DESCONOCIDOS Y/O PARTES CON INTERÉS EN DICHA SUCESIÓN.
LA SECRETARIA que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 24 de mayo de 2023, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 60 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 30 de mayo de 2023. En San Juan, Puerto Rico, el 30 de mayo de 2023. GRISELDA RODRÍGUEZ COLLADO, SECRETARIA REGIONAL. ELSA MAGALY CANDELARIO CABRERA, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR DEL TRIBUNAL I. LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE CAROLINA
BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO
Demandante V.
SONIA M. ROSA SANTOS, R&G MORTGAGE CORPORATION, JOHN DOE
Demandadas
Civil Núm.: CA2023CV01649.
Sobre: CANCELACIÓN DE PAGARÉ EXTRAVIADO POR LA VÍA JUDICIAL. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, S.S.
A: R&G MORTGAGE CORPORATION Y JOHN
DOE COMO TENEDORES DESCONOCIDOS DEL PAGARÉ a favor de R&G Mortgage Corporation, o a su orden, por la suma principal de $53,000.00, intereses al 8.875%, vencedero el día 1 de marzo de 2015, constituida mediante la escritura número 121, otorgada en San Juan, Puerto Rico, el día 7 de febrero de 2000, ante la notario Sandra De L. Tous-Chevres, e inscrita tomo móvil 913 de Carolina, finca número 10,891, Registro de la Propiedad de Puerto Rico, Primera Sección de Carolina.
Por la presente se le emplaza y notifica que debe contestar la demanda incoada en su contra dentro del término de treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación del presente edicto. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired.ramajudicial. pr/sumac/, salvo que se represente por derecho propio. Si usted deja de presentar y notificar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el Tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la Demanda, o cualquier otro, si el Tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente. Los abogados de la parte demandante son:
ABOGADOS DE LA PARTE
DEMANDANTE:
Lcdo. Reggie Díaz Hernández RUA Núm.: 16,393
BERMUDEZ & DIAZ LLP
Suite 209
500 Calle De La Tanca San Juan, Puerto Rico 00901
Tel.: (787) 523-2670
Fax: (787) 523-2664 rdíaz@bdprlaw.com
Expido este edicto bajo mi firma y el sello de este Tribunal, hoy 25 de mayo de 2023. KANELLY ZAYAS ROBLES, SECRETARIA GENERAL. KEILA GARCÍA SOLÍS, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
LEGAL NOTICE
ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA
SALA SUPERIOR DE ARECIBO
BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO
Demandante V.
PABLO VELÁZQUEZ
VÁZQUEZ; LISABEL
GONZÁLEZ ROSA; JOSÉ MARTÍN GONZÁLEZ;
ELVIS GONZÁLEZ; Y LA SUCESIÓN DE LYDIA IRIS ROSA ROMÁN COMPUESTA POR: LISABEL GONZÁLEZ ROSA; FULANO DE TAL Y MENGANO DE TAL LOS POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS; DEPARTAMENTO DE HACIENDA; DEPARTAMENTO DE JUSTICIA; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA
Demandados
Civil Núm.: AR2022CV02283. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO Y EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, S.S.
A: LISABEL GONZÁLEZ ROSA; JOSÉ MARTÍN GONZÁLEZ Y ELVIS GONZÁLEZ.
Por la presente se le emplaza y notifica que debe contestar la demanda dentro del término de treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación del presente edicto. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired. ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del tribunal. Se le apercibe que, de no contestar la demanda dentro del término aquí estipulado, se le anotará la rebeldía y se dictará sentencia sin más citarle ni oírle. Por la presente el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, conforme al caso de Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria vs. Latinoamericana de Exportación, lnc., 164 D.P.R. 689 (2005), le ordena que en el término de treinta (30) días, haga declaración aceptando o repudiando la herencia de LA SUCESIÓN DE LYDIA IRIS ROSA ROMÁN. Se le apercibe que de no expresar su intención de aceptar o repudiar la herencia dentro del término que se le fijó, la herencia se tendrá por aceptada. Los abogados de la parte demandante son: Lcdo. Guillermo A. Somoza Colombani, P.O. Box 366603, San Juan, PR 00936-6603. Tel. (787) 919-0073, Fax (787) 6415016. Expido este edicto bajo mi firma y sello de este Tribunal, hoy 24 de mayo de 2023.
VIVIAN Y. FRESSE GONZÁLEZ, SECRETARIA REGIONAL. JACQUELYNE GONZÁLEZ QUINTANA, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.
By KURT STREETER
In the 2023 NBA playoffs, LeBron James got in on the act. And Stephen Curry, and the league’s MVP, Joel Embiid. Kyle Lowry keeps trying, but, oh, does he need help. Even Nikola Jokic has taken a bow.
Yes, this postseason has showcased the beauty of basketball. The upstarts, upsets and dominance. The Miami Heat putting the kibosh on the comeback of comebacks in the Eastern Conference finals. But it has also been marred by players of all stripes — ahem, Malik Monk, the sixth man for the Sacramento Kings — falling and flailing as if stung by a cattle prod.
All in desperate attempts to hoodwink referees into calling fouls.
Welcome to the National Basketball Floppers Association.
Flopping isn’t new, of course. In the 1970s, Red Auerbach, the Boston Celtics’ fabled and curmudgeonly leader, railed on national television against the “Hollywood acting” that was sullying the game.
“NBA floppers are almost always overacting,” said Anthony Gilardi, a Hollywood acting coach. “You watch these guys with their pratfalls and their on-court stunts, and it’s so over-the-top cringeworthy as to be hilarious.”
I asked Gilardi to watch video clips of sham playoff tumbles and offer an assessment. He had seen most of the plays and knew the subject well. He’s a Celtics fan who has seen all of Marcus Smart’s greatest flops.
There’s a vast difference, Gilardi said, between players reacting to contact in a way that creates an illusion that a foul has occurred and being so obvious that every fan in the arena can tell the reaction is fake. It is the difference between what we see from an Oscar nominee and an actor on a run-of-the-mill soap opera.
“In soap operas, it’s often the case you can absolutely tell they are acting,” he said, emphasizing the word the way Heat guard Max Strus would a shoulder bump. “There’s not enough subtlety to create the illusion.”
Gilardi offered a few suggestions for ways hardwood entertainers could refine their technique.
— Go deeply into the part. Milk it for all it’s worth, even if that means limping after the foul has been called.
— If you’re going to fake an injury, for
God’s sake, get the specific body part right: No more holding your arm as if it were run over by a tank when you’ve been bumped in the chest.
— Relax and focus. The art is in the subtlety, not in the effort of trying to convince.
Do all of these, and the deception won’t be so evident as to embarrass officials or raise howls from fans, cackling criticism from television analysts or a clampdown by the suits in the league office.
“If they worked on this the right way,” Gilardi said, “there’s a world where some of these flops would be so good, they might not even be considered flops. Now that is good acting.”
After seeing the NBA try, and fail, to stop flopping for more than a decade, today’s players can’t seem to help themselves. I don’t have a number to back this up, but the eye test tells you all you need to know. Flopping pervades the playoffs like tumbleweeds on a dusty desert plain.
Google “Mat Ishbia Playoffs Ridiculous Flop” and you’ll see even the billionaire owner of the Phoenix Suns take a courtside dive.
Bearing witness to the Warriors’ flopheavy loss to the Los Angeles Lakers in the Western Conference semifinals, Golden State coach Steve Kerr made a personal plea to end the “gamesmanship” and canny ploys “to fool the refs.”
His solution: Have NBA referees call technical fouls against floppers, as officials do in the international game. The league is now reportedly considering a test run at enforcement during summer exhibitions.
I say, not so fast.
NBA referees have a hard enough time deciding whether James Harden is carrying the ball 10 steps on his way to a layup is worth calling a travel. Now they would have the added burden of deciding, in real time, whether a foul was tried-and-true or hardwood chicanery. Odds of success? Slim.
And remember: Eleven years ago, the league announced a plan to fine players for
flops. Handing down $5,000 fines to obsessively ambitious, multimillionaire athletes who would walk on shards of glass to win a championship didn’t quite do the trick. The flop, part acting and part competition, is now baked into the NBA. It shows off athleticism and skill, a deep thirst for winning as well as showmanship — attributes that define the league. It’s all part of the spectacle.
So why not have some fun with it? Maybe, instead of resisting and demonizing the flop, we should embrace it — but demand better acting.
Take, for instance, the back-to-back theatrics delivered by Jokic and James late in Game 2 of the Western Conference finals. James’ performance was a thing to behold. After Jokic brushed against him — yes, brushed — while attempting a pass, James broke out the vaudeville. His face contorted into a grimace. He twisted his 6-foot9, 250-pound body, backpedaled, leaped backward and slid halfway across the width of the court until he landed at the feet of courtside spectators, spilling the drink of one who even offered James a towel. He offered a syrupy thank you in response.
What a charade!
But the flop worked. A foul was called on Jokic and the ball awarded to the Lakers. James leaped up, alert, energetic and showing not an ounce of injury. In a flash, he took an inbounds pass and dribbled upcourt. Jokic and the Denver Nuggets still won that game, and swept that series. With the dominant way Jokic has been playing to get his team to the franchise’s first NBA Finals, the concept of stopping him seems like pure theater.
After everything that Novak Djokovic had put himself through over the past few years, the French Open began with the possibility, finally, of a Grand Slam tournament free of drama.
But three days into the Open, Djokovic has put himself at the center of the mounting international crisis in the Balkans, where ethnic Serbs and Albanians have clashed in recent days in the conflict over Kosovo.
The message that the Serbian tennis star scrawled Monday night on a plexiglass plate overlaid on a television camera lens — “Kosovo is at the heart of Serbia” — has sports officials calling for him to be disciplined, muzzled or both, and Albanian loyalists calling him a fascist.
“A drama-free Grand Slam, I don’t think it will happen for me,” Djokovic said after he beat Marton Fucsovics of Hungary on Wednesday night in Paris. “I guess that drives me, as well.”
The 22-time Grand Slam tournament champion struggled to find his timing early on, with the wind gusting as day turned to night. But as the light faded the wind did too, and Djokovic cruised, finishing off the steady Fucsovics, 7-6 (2), 6-0, 6-3, in 2 hours and 44 minutes. But as it is so often with Djokovic, what is happening on the tennis court this week is only a fraction of the story.
The World Health Organization recently declared an end to the COVID-19 health emergency and the United States ended its requirement for foreign travelers to be vaccinated against the coronavirus, ending discussion of Djokovic’s decision not to receive the vaccination. He was forced to skip some of the most important tournaments in tennis over the past two years, and last year was detained and deported from Australia before the Open.
He didn’t even have to worry about his main nemesis, with Rafael Nadal miss-
ing this year’s French Open, a tournament he has won 14 times, because of an injury. Djokovic continues his usual march toward the second week of the tournament — although top-seeded Carlos Alcaraz may pose trouble.
After Djokovic’s first-round match Monday, like every winning player on the stadium courts at major tennis tournaments, he grabbed a marker for the traditional signing of the courtside television camera.
The practice, which began in the 2000s as a way for players to connect with fans, gives them an opportunity to send an international television audience a typically cheerful message like “Vamos!” (Spanish for “Let’s go!”), wish a loved one “happy birthday” or write their child’s name.
Occasionally the scrawl expresses a political opinion. In the days before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Russian player Andrey Rublev wrote “No War Please” on the lens plate.
Writing in his native language and drawing a heart, Djokovic’s message followed a weekend of violent clashes between Serbian protesters and NATO forces who have been trying to maintain a tense peace in the region for 15 years.
Roughly an hour later, during the Serbian portion of his post-match news conference, Djokovic, whose past political statements have been suffused with Serbian
nationalism, doubled down.
“I am against wars, violence and any kind of conflict, as I’ve always stated publicly,” Djokovic said, according to the widely circulated translations. “I empathize with all people, but the situation with Kosovo is a precedent in international law.” He called Kosovo, “our hearthstone, our stronghold,” and said, “Our most important monasteries are there.”
Almost immediately, the statements sparked the expected reactions at the polarized ends of the conflict: hero worship from Serbs, and outrage from the ethnic Albanians who account for the overwhelming majority of the population in Kosovo but are vastly outnumbered in a handful of villages and small cities. The groups, Orthodox Christians on one side, Muslims on the other, have been fighting on and off for control in the region for hundreds of years, dating back to the Ottoman Empire.
Jeta Xharra, a human rights activist in Kosovo, said in an interview Tuesday that Djokovic’s statements represented a “medieval mentality” that she compared to the thinking that led Russia to invade Ukraine last year.
“It’s appalling for a man of his stature to use sports to push a fascist mentality,” she said.
The Kosovan Olympic Committee has called for the International Olympic Committee and the International Tennis Federation to take disciplinary action against Djokovic.
For its part, French Open officials have opted to stay out of the conflict. There is nothing in the rule book that prohibits a player from making political statements. France’s tennis federation, the FFT, said it was “understandable” that players would discuss international events. However, the French sports minister, Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, called Djokovic’s statement “inappropriate” during a television interview, saying it was “very activist” and “very political” and that he “shouldn’t get involved again.”
Judging from Djokovic’s recent and not-so-recent behavior, that is not an option, and he said as much during his statement after his first match.
“This is the least I could have done,” he said in his native language. “I feel the responsibility as a public figure — doesn’t
matter in which field — to give support.”
For Djokovic, the statements have had increased impact because with the war in Ukraine garnering so much attention, few outside the Balkans were aware of just how heightened the tensions in Kosovo have become during the past week — as heightened as they have been since Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008.
An international military force has attempted to maintain peace in the region for decades. More than 100 countries have recognized Kosovo. Serbia and Russia have not. Ethnic Serbs who live in Kosovo boycotted local elections last month in the northern part of the country where Serbs hold majorities. That allowed Albanian candidates to win control, in their view.
The five countries that control the peacekeeping force in the region — the United States, France, Italy, Germany and Britain — asked Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian leadership not to send in security forces to take control of town municipal buildings following the elections. It did anyway, a move that the five countries condemned. The Serbs protested the takeover, sparking the violent clashes that wounded 30 members of the NATO peacekeeping force, known as KFOR.
President Aleksandar Vucic of Serbia claimed that 52 Serbs were injured in the clashes, three seriously. He put the Serbian army on high alert and sent his troops to the border.
Watching events unfold from Paris as he prepared for the French Open, Djokovic searched for a way to express two emotions — a desire for peace and the belief that Kosovo is part of Serbia. He has often spoken of the traumatic experience of growing up in a war zone, with bombs falling not far from his home during the conflict in the Balkans in the 1990s. He has said that anyone who has lived through that experience could never be in favor of war and violence. He used those words in January, when controversy found him at the Australian Open after his father, who was born in Kosovo, was caught on video posing with a fan of his son’s who was holding a Russian flag.
In 2008, when Djokovic was a young player breaking into the sport’s elite ranks, he recorded a video expressing solidarity with protesters in Belgrade, Serbia, after Kosovo declared independence.
“Of course, I’m aware that a lot of people would disagree,” he said as midnight closed in Wednesday. “But it is what it is. It’s something that I stand for.”
“A drama-free Grand Slam, I don’t think it will happen for me,” Novak Djokovic said after he beat Marton Fucsovics of Hungary on Wednesday.
Fill in the empty fields with the numbers from 1 through 9.
Sudoku Rules:
Every row must contain the numbers from 1 through 9
Every column must contain the numbers from 1 through 9
Every 3x3 square must contain the numbers from 1 through 9
Answers on page 30
Aries (Mar 21-April 20)
Disturbing dreams or unsettling moods could arise today, causing you to wonder if something is wrong or something bad is going to happen. Let it go, Aries. If anything goes wrong, it isn’t likely to be anything major. A recent event may have triggered old impressions that are causing these feelings. You could also be picking up on others’ moods, as your intuition is high.
Taurus (April 21-May 21)
Disconcerting developments in the lives of family members could cause some stress at home. There could be some problems with the structure of the house itself. Perhaps the plumbing or electricity needs attention. If a family member is upset, Taurus, keep the lines of communication open. If there are problems that need attention, get them out of the way now.
Gemini (May 22-June 21)
Don’t be surprised if many visitors come to your door today. A relative or co-worker could be in a black mood, which could spill over to you, as you’re feeling more intuitive than usual. Realize that this isn’t coming from you, Gemini, and let it go! Misinformation could come your way by phone, email, or mail. Check out the facts before you buy into it.
Cancer (June 22-July 23)
Low biorhythms could have you feeling a little depressed. You may tend to doubt your goals and abilities. Don’t let this send you into a fit of gloom, Cancer. All is better than it seems. Realize that today you’re likely to blow every little setback out of proportion. Give everything you try your very best effort. Go out tonight and have a good time!
Leo (July 24-Aug 23)
Communication with friends or family may not come easily today, Leo. An unusual level of inhibition could keep you from reaching out to others. You might try to shake this off by working too hard, even if you aren’t sure exactly what you want to do. This is a good day to read, study, or work on projects in solitude. A long walk during the day could clear your head and reignite your enthusiasm.
Your intuition is likely to be operating at a very high level today, Virgo. This isn’t a good day to be around sick or depressed people. You will probably pick up their gloom and it could possibly spoil your day. This is a good day to finish old projects that you may have postponed. Your insights and ingenuity are likelier than usual to give you the motivation you need.
Libra (Sep 24-Oct 23)
Fear about your financial security could plague you today, Libra. Dissatisfaction with some of work you’ve been doing and delays in reaching some of your goals might have you wondering what you could do better. Doubts about a friend’s motives might cause you to waver in your trust of that person. Take the time to consider everything objectively. All is probably not as it seems.
Scorpio (Oct 24-Nov 22)
Have you been wondering if you’re in the right profession? Disillusionment with your field could have you feeling mildly ill from stress and considering a total career change. Perhaps this is the right course of action to take, but perhaps not. Look into the options available and see how you feel about them, Scorpio, but wait a few days before making any final decisions.
Sagittarius (Nov 23-Dec 21)
Unsettling news from far away could have you somewhat upset and a little depressed. The temptation to withdraw and brood might seem too strong to resist, but this may not be the best course of action. Getting things done is likely to be the best therapy in emotional situations like this, Sagittarius. So if there’s a new project you’ve been considering, this is the day to start it.
Capricorn (Dec 22-Jan 20)
A friend might be ill, causing you considerable worry. One of the goals you’ve been trying to reach could be delayed in some way, causing frustration. Your financial situation could also be on your mind. You could be worrying needlessly, Capricorn. The situation is cloudy and may not be as unsettling as it seems. You may have received some misinformation. Check the facts before making yourself crazy.
Aquarius (Jan 21-Feb 19)
Recent days may have kept you busy, with a dynaRelations with colleagues could be a bit strained due to increased job stress. If you’ve been thinking of entering a business or romantic partnership, this isn’t the day to decide. Your mind may be a bit muddled. Misunderstandings or misinformation could cause you to doubt the wisdom of the partnership. This needs to be considered objectively, Aquarius. Your doubts may be groundless.
Pisces (Feb 20-Mar 20)
Today you might feel a little under the weather due to physical and emotional stress over the past few days. Take it easy today if you can. This isn’t the day to be too busy or start new projects. Miscommunication could cause an upset or two, Pisces, so try to maintain your cool. Don’t make mountains out of molehills. Nothing will come up that can’t be handled.
