Crime Scene

Dog bites cop, cop kills dog

While responding to a domestic disturbance call last month, Plantation police officer Brian Radziwon shot and killed a German Shepherd that allegedly attacked him as his owner stood by and did nothing.

Radziwon was dispatched to a house in the 900 block of Country Club Circle shortly before 12:30 p.m. Jan. 13. When he arrived at the house, the dog was in the front yard, unleashed.

According to a police report, the dog approached Radziwon as he stood by his police cruiser. Radziwon began shouting "Get him back. Get him back!" to the dog's owner, Carmen Gonzalez, who was standing nearby. Gonzalez did nothing to stop the dog.

The German Shepherd lunged at Radziwon and bit his left leg, just below the knee.

"I felt pain in my knee," Radziwon wrote in the report.

The officer says he continued yelling at the dog, "Get away," but the animal remained in attack mode. Then, Radziwon drew his gun and shot the dog twice.

The dog ran a few steps, then collapsed.

Radziwon says the dog's teeth "damaged my pants and left three scratches on my left leg." He drove himself to Plantation General Hospital, where he was treated and released.

Broward County Animal Control issued Gonzalez a citation for the animal bite.

Hollywood (Fla.) in the news

If you didn't know about the east coast Hollywood (as in Florida), you do now. First, Anna Nicole Smith's death (Although technically not in Hollywood but at a Seminole Indian reservation. Her body was brought to a Hollywood hospital). Now Wednesday's U-Haul chase through two counties broadcast across the country.

Just a day before, media from across the country camped outside the Hollywood PD offices clamoring for the call from the Seminole tribal police dispatch to Hollywood PD about Smith.

On Wednesday, Hollywood police spokesman Capt. Tony Rode was talking to them again. One national news network even asked him to do an interview while the U-Haul chase was still going on, he said.

Recipe for a Florida story

Ingredient list:

1 Overcrowded DMV office.

1 Elderly driver.

1 Older-model Mercury Grand Marquis.

Next: Preheat driver-licensing office to hot and stuffy. In parking lot, combine elderly driver and Grand Marquis. Stand back as driver tries to back out of spot but instead shifts into "drive."

It's what happened Wednesday at the motor vehicle office on Military Trail in Deerfield Beach. Boca Raton resident Therese M. Smith, 80, went in to re-take her driving exam, according to the Florida Highway Patrol. When Smith went to leave, she accidentally sent her 1990 car plowing through a glass window, right into the state office.

Eleven people were treated for injuries; Smith was not harmed but was charged with careless driving.

As for her driving exam: It was postponed because Smith's passenger-side door was broken and the test-giver couldn't get inside.

A big steal

Christine Avon told Davie police that while she was out of town last month someone stole the $7,000 air conditioning unit from the side of her home.

From the sound of it, that was no easy task.

The AC unit weighed five tons. That's 10,000 pounds. The average car weighs about 4,000 pounds, or two tons.

Avon said her neighbors in the 3400 block of Southwest 59th Avenue didn't see anything fishy.

Police haven't caught the AC bandit.

Cell phone caper

A burglar who nabbed a half-dozen cell phones from a Coral Gables business is in for a big surprise: The phones aren't real.

The crook actually made off with display cell phones, police say.

It happened earlier this month at the IntelliCom Wireless Center, 2261 Ponce De Leon Blvd. While the store was closed, the suspect smashed the front window and grabbed the goods.

Employees say the pseudo-phones don't work and have little re-sale value.

"They must have thought the phones were real,'' said Mariu Santana, a manager. "We don't like using live phones in the window. We only use the demos."

Real-life Hamburglar

No Big Macs, Quarter Pounders or fries were stolen when someone broke into a Pembroke Pines McDonald's last month.

Instead, burglars ransacked a back office of the fast food restaurant and cleared out the safe, which contained $4,100 cash. The closed-circuit television recorder was also ripped from the wall.

The thieves broke into the McDonald's at 11100 Taft St. between 12:15 and 5:30 a.m. Jan. 21.

When the morning manager arrived at 5:30 a.m., the door was unlocked and the alarm unactivated.

Police dusted for fingerprints on cash tills and cabinet doors, but came up with nothing.

Deadly weekend in Broward

A man and a woman were gunned down in two separate incidents in Broward this weekend.

Their deaths bring the number of homicides in the county to 17 since the new year.

The first shooting happened on Friday night.

The Broward Sheriff's Office was called to a Pembroke Park apartment complex at 9:45 p.m. When deputies arrived, they found a woman outside the building, bleeding from a gunshot wound to the face.

That woman, still alive, directed them to apartment 205, where Wendy Matthews lay dead. Matthews was 28. The other woman remains hospitalized in critical condition.

Just a few hours later - around 2:30 a.m. Saturday - a 29-year-old man, Clifton Sparrow, was shot to death in Fort Lauderdale.

Both their killers got away.

Back in business

The City of Miami had actually not logged a homicide since Curtis Dopson died Jan. 26, a murder now known across the country because detectives questioned Cincinnati Bengals star Chad Johnson. The spell gave investigators on the fifth-floor a breather, time to catch up on pending cases.

It was, of course, just a matter of time. They almost logged one Wednesday morning in Overtown, when two gunmen sprayed an apartment building with gunfire and wounded a 27-year-old. Another Miami brazen daylight attack. The man survived. On a separate note, I'm being followed by Daniel Laine, a French documentary filmmaker who is working on Miami piece. I joked with the Miami cops that now I have my own First 48.

In the evening, the entire homicide unit was having a meeting when the radio crackled that a man just shot had died on Northwest 12th Place off 43rd Street. Needless to say, the whole unit was out there helping out.

Even astronauts are human

The steel mallet, the knife, the adult diapers -- you just can't get enough of the astronaut love saga. I don't blame you. I'm sure you've read the Miami Herald story. But why stop there. Here are few other takes, in no particular order:

The other Space Coast -- Houston

The waaaaay over there coast -- LA Times

The always enjoyable Washington Post

The always entertaining New York Daily News

Robber caught on tape

The Miami Herald's Andrea Torres reports on a bank robber who clearly isn't camera shy:

Miami-Dade police think this guy pictured at left flashing his gun to a teller (and the surveillance camera) may be responsible for three robberies.

In his latest - a Feb. 1 heist at Commerce Bank in Pinecrest - witnesses reported seeing him escape in a newer-model dark sedan with tinted windows, possibly a Mitsubishi.

Anyone with information leading to his arrest stands to receive a $1,000 reward from Crime Stoppers. Call them anonymously with tips at 305-471-8477.