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Tag: councilman

  • Miami-area councilman launches expletive-laced rant against ICE from dais

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    A screenshot from the Jan. 22 Village of El Portal, Florida, Planning and Zoning meeting video shows Councilman Anders Urbom closing one eye and miming a gun-aiming ‘wink’ as he repeatedly uses the N-word, while Councilperson Anna E. Lightfoot-Ward, seated beside him, looks down. This came after Urbom launched into a diatribe from the dais against ICE and Customs and Border Protection.

    A screenshot from the Jan. 22 Village of El Portal, Florida, Planning and Zoning meeting video shows Councilman Anders Urbom closing one eye and miming a gun-aiming ‘wink’ as he repeatedly uses the N-word, while Councilperson Anna E. Lightfoot-Ward, seated beside him, looks down. This came after Urbom launched into a diatribe from the dais against ICE and Customs and Border Protection.

    Screengrab from Village of El Portal meeting video

    An El Portal meeting quickly devolved after a councilman launched an expletive-filled attack on ICE and U.S Customs and Border Protection, using a racial epithet in his rant.

    The incident began when Councilman Anders Urbom, speaking during the Village’s Jan. 22 Planning and Zoning committee meeting, described witnessing a traffic stop on Biscayne Boulevard by Border Protection agents.

    Urbom told the committee members, who are the village council members, and attendees he had been traveling north on Biscayne Boulevard in Miami when he saw a Border Protection agent in a parking lot conducting a traffic stop.

    “It just seemed odd that a CBP officer was doing a traffic stop,” Urbom said, adding that he pulled into a nearby KFC parking lot and began filming.

    Urbom described the encounter as civil, saying the agent did not handcuff the person being detained and allowed the person to keep his cellphone. Urbom said the federal agent ultimately left with one of two men, while the other remained with the vehicle.

    After the agent departed, Urbom said he approached the man who stayed behind and asked why they were stopped. Urbom claimed the agent used something minor as an excuse, pointing to the multiple registration stickers many Miami-Dade drivers place on their license plates.

    Urbom’s remarks, captured on the village’s meeting video, then spiraled.

    He said “every white person in this country who voted for Trump” is racist, using the N word in his rant. He then mimed holding a gun, and later raised his arms as though holding a long gun, the video shows. He unleashed profanities at ICE and CBP, including “motherf——” and “f— ICE.”

    Urbom is the newest member of the Village Council, elected in 2019. Mayor Omarr C. Nickerson put the brakes on the outburst to which Urbom responded, “It’s over, it’s over,” the recording shows.

    Vice Mayor Darian Martin, who is Black, condemned Urbom’s use of the racial epithet.

    “I do think it is horribly offensive for that word to be mentioned in any context,” Martin said. “I do say that as a white man you [Urbom] should not be saying the N word in any context and I take great offense to it and I think that you owe us an apology,” he added, drawing applause.

    Urbom replied that he would apologize, but said he meant no offense to anyone other than “the white Christians who voted for Trump,” according to the video. Urbom’s remarks came during the “Good and Welfare” portion toward the end of the meeting, an agenda slot typically reserved for informal, non-voting comments and general community updates.

    Urbom did not reply to an email asking about the incident. His online bio on the Village’s website says “his main priorities are public safety, public works (including tree trimming, swales, and septic-to-sewer), and traffic plus pedestrian/cyclist safety.”

    The next El Portal City Council meeting is 7 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 27, at Village Hall, 500 NE 87th St. Residents who want to weigh in can do so during public comment.

    Joan Chrissos

    Miami Herald

    Joan Chrissos is a longtime editor at the Herald who occasionally writes stories off the news and food, travel and features stories. She has a master’s from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism.

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    Theo Karantsalis

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  • Boy fatally shot after ‘ding dong ditch’ doorbell-ringing prank

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    Boy fatally shot after ‘ding dong ditch’ doorbell-ringing prank, police say

    Updated: 9:00 AM EDT Sep 1, 2025

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    An 11-year-old boy was fatally shot in Houston after a prank in which he rang the doorbell of a home and ran away, police said Sunday.The boy had been ringing doorbells as a prank late Saturday evening, the Houston Police Department said in a statement. Commonly referred to as “ding dong ditching,” the prank involves fleeing before someone inside the home opens the door. The boy, who has not yet been identified, died of his wounds Sunday, police said.Police spokesperson Shay Awosiyan said that officers were still investigating and had not arrested anybody in connection with the boy’s death as of Sunday evening.Other “ding dong ditch” pranks have turned deadly in the past. In 2023, a Southern California man was convicted on three counts of first-degree murder for killing three teenage boys by intentionally ramming their car after they rang his doorbell as a prank.And in May, a Virginia man was charged with second-degree murder for fatally shooting an 18-year-old who had rung his doorbell while filming a TikTok video of the prank, the New York Times reported.

    HOUSTON —

    An 11-year-old boy was fatally shot in Houston after a prank in which he rang the doorbell of a home and ran away, police said Sunday.

    The boy had been ringing doorbells as a prank late Saturday evening, the Houston Police Department said in a statement. Commonly referred to as “ding dong ditching,” the prank involves fleeing before someone inside the home opens the door.

    The boy, who has not yet been identified, died of his wounds Sunday, police said.

    Police spokesperson Shay Awosiyan said that officers were still investigating and had not arrested anybody in connection with the boy’s death as of Sunday evening.

    Other “ding dong ditch” pranks have turned deadly in the past. In 2023, a Southern California man was convicted on three counts of first-degree murder for killing three teenage boys by intentionally ramming their car after they rang his doorbell as a prank.

    And in May, a Virginia man was charged with second-degree murder for fatally shooting an 18-year-old who had rung his doorbell while filming a TikTok video of the prank, the New York Times reported.

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  • Councilman caught peeing on door outside a bar resigns

    Councilman caught peeing on door outside a bar resigns

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    A councilman who went No. 1 has been 86’d from his post.

    Crescenta Valley Town Councilmember Chris Kilpatrick resigned from office after surveillance video showed him and another man urinating outside an LGBTQ+ bar in downtown Los Angeles. Kilpatrick and his boyfriend were seen relieving themselves at the employee entrance to Precinct, a bar on South Broadway, sometime around 2 a.m. Saturday, according to video posted to the bar’s Instagram.

    The two men walked out of the bar carrying cocktail glasses just before they urinated on a set of glass doors, according to the post. An employee approached the men and tried to take their drinks away.

    But the taller man, who was later identified as Kilpatrick, threw the employee to the ground, according to the post.

    “Precinct is a safe space for all; let’s have a good time,” the post said before urging patrons not to be jerks (in cruder terms). “Oh, yeah, we also have several bathrooms.”

    Kilpatrick’s attorney, John Duran, said two employees from the bar approached Kilpatrick and his boyfriend without identifying themselves and aggressively grabbed Kilpatrick, asking him if he had been at the bar.

    “My client instinctively pushed back in self defense,” Duran said in a statement. “It was reasonable for him to believe that they were about to possibly be gay-bashed” by the bar employees, who were not in uniform.

    Duran, who served several terms on the West Hollywood City Council before losing his bid for reelection in 2020, knows something about scandals in office. The city paid $500,000 in 2016 to settle a sexual harassment lawsuit against him, and more allegations in 2019 led to protests calling for his resignation.

    While Kilpatrick was not identified in the Instagram post, people wrote in the comments that it looked like Kilpatrick, who was elected to the Crescenta Valley Town Council in 2020.

    Crescenta Valley, northwest of Pasadena, includes the cities of Montrose, Sunland and La Cañada Flintridge, along with sections of the city of Glendale. The town council where Kilpatrick served works as “an advisory body, advocating for interests and concerns of our residents,” according to the Council President Harry Leon in a recent blog post.

    Council members learned about the surveillance video on Tuesday and asked Kilpatrick for a statement, but by that time he had retained an attorney, according to a letter detailing the council’s response. Leon called for a special meeting about the issue, but before it could take place Kilpatrick “expressed his desire to resign from the council,” the letter said.

    His resignation was accepted by the council and effective that day.

    “While we do not condone any of the behavior we observed on social media, we appreciate his 3 years of commitment and dedication to the community while serving on the council,” the council leadership said in the letter.

    Duran, Kilpatrick’s attorney, said that public urination is not a criminal offense, and battery is a misdemeanor offense, including “unlawful touching as exhibited by individual one who grabbed my client first.”

    It’s unclear if the bar employee was injured during the incident.

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    Nathan Solis

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  • Shooting outside Shreveport councilman’s election night watch party

    Shooting outside Shreveport councilman’s election night watch party

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    SHREVEPORT, La. – One man was injured after shots were fired from a passing vehicle near an election watch party for a Shreveport City councilman Tuesday evening.

    It happened at Southern Hills Business Association in the 9700 block of Baird Road as the party was being held for Councilman Alan Jackson. A least a half dozen police units were on the scene at about 9 p.m. 

    A man who was reportedly going to the party was hit in the upper body when the shots were fired. His wounds are considered non-life threatening.

    Detectives determined the victim was shot while he was inside of a vehicle that was in the roadway and not at the election party. The shooting suspect is believed to have left the scene in a vehicle vehicle. 

    At this time there is no indication that the attack was in anyway politically motivated or related to the election party; however, the investigation is still in the early stages, police said Wednesday. 

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