Alex DeLuca

Miami

Writer at Miami New Times

writer @miaminewtimes. tips: [email protected] or DM for Signal

Articles

Florida Alligator Caught on Video Eating Mango Because, Well, Florida

1 week ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

In South Florida, even the alligators refuse to miss out on mango season. A now-viral video posted over Memorial Day weekend by NBC 6 South Florida shows an alligator casually munching on a mango near a lake in Weston, a planned suburb that borders the Everglades in western Broward County. The footage shows the reptile, perched on a grassy bank, open its massive jaws to bite into the fruit, gobble it down, and swallow it whole before slowly retreating into the water.
Miami Rallies Behind Boia De After Chef, Wine Director's Home Burns Down

1 week ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

The Miami community is rallying behind a beloved local restaurant after a fire destroyed the home of two of its employees. According to a GoFundMe fundraiser created on behalf of Boia De's chef de cuisine, Ilaria Brusaterra, and wine director, Gabriela Ospina, the duo recently lost their home, most of their belongings, and their cats in a "freak electrical fire" while they were at work.
Miami Federal Prison Quietly Detaining Hundreds of Immigrants

1 week ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

Miami's downtown federal prison is quietly doubling as an immigration detention center, housing hundreds of detainees in a facility designed for criminal defendants awaiting trial.
Video: Miami Cop Shoots Into Man's Car Outside Bayfront Park

1 week ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

On Sunday, Miami police officers were directing traffic outside Bayfront Park during a music festival when things suddenly took a violent turn. The Miami Police Department (MPD) claims that 21-year-old Menelek Emmanuel Clarke used his car to hit an officer who was directing traffic outside the downtown Miami park, where the Caribbean music festival Best of the Best was taking place. In response, police say, the officer shot Clarke multiple times.
Miami Vending Machine Is Selling Labubu Dolls: Where to Find Them

2 weeks ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

Miami's latest obsession might be sitting inside a vending machine inside Dolphin Mall. The Chinese retailer Pop Mart — known for its "blind boxes," or randomized sets of the now-viral Labubu dolls (pronounced la-boo-boo) — has officially brought one of its vending machines to the sprawling outlet mall. A recent TikTok video captured long lines of people waiting their turn to snag something from the bright yellow machine, which appears to be Pop Mart's first location in Florida.
Photos: Inside Miami's Krome Detention Center In the 1980s

2 weeks ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca |Gary Monroe

Miami Beach native Gary Monroe spent decades traveling the world with his Leica film camera, photographing everyday people and places including Haiti, India, Trinidad, Cuba, Brazil, and Poland. Closer to home, his lens captured some of Florida's most overlooked communities — from the elderly Jewish residents of South Beach in the late 1970s, to Little Haiti in the 1980s, to a secluded group of sex offenders in St. Petersburg in the late 2000s.
Miami Police Cleared in Shooting of Mentally Ill Man With Screwdriver

3 weeks ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

The Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office (SAO) has cleared a City of Miami police officer in the shooting of a mentally ill Black man armed with a screwdriver. The state attorney's office found that City of Miami police officer Kassandra Mercado acted lawfully when she fired six rounds of bullets into then 47-year-old Donald Armstrong, who was reportedly high on ecstasy and experiencing a mental health crisis when officers surrounded him on his Liberty City porch last March.
ICE Detains Breastfeeding Florida Mom, Holds Her in Broward Facility

3 weeks ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

Yury Ussa Polania met Cristian* in Bogotá, Colombia, in 2011. What began as a friendship quickly blossomed into love, and by 2013, they were married with a baby on the way. *Cristian is identified only by his first name in this story to safeguard his identity. Raised in a family of political activists, Ussa Polania naturally followed in their footsteps. But as it became increasingly unsafe for her family to stay in the country, the risks grew too great to ignore.
Broward TikToker Says Border Patrol Detained Her, Searched Phone at MIA

4 weeks ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

On the evening of April 26, Sav* was returning home from a vacation in Europe when, she says, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) officers pulled her aside in the Global Entry line at the Miami International Airport. The young woman from Fort Lauderdale (identified only by her first name in this story to safeguard her identity) says she'd just scanned her face on a facial recognition kiosk when an officer asked her to step aside and began asking questions: where was she coming from?
'Latinas for Trump' Cofounder With Arrest Record Runs for Miami Office Again

1 month ago | miaminewtimes.com | Alex DeLuca

Denise Galvez Turros, a Cuban-American PR professional and co-founder of Latinas for Trump, is again seeking local office despite her checkered past. Galvez Turros will face off against Carollo's brother, former commissioner Frank Carollo, and Brenda Betancourt, president of the Calle Ocho Inter-American Chamber of Commerce and a frequent speaker at commission meetings.