Wednesday Mar 20, 2024

GOOD MORNING March 20, 2024

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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.

Ex-governor’s trial scheduled for early next year

By THE STAR STAFF

U.S. District Judge Silvia Carreño Coll has scheduled the criminal trial against former Gov. Wanda Vázquez Garced, Venezuelan banker Julio Herrera Velutini and former FBI agent Mark Rossini for Jan. 21, 2025.

The trial will occur after the general elections and the swearing-in of a new governor. The parties could not agree to start the trial this year.

The three were charged with seven counts related to an alleged bribery scheme to benefit Vázquez Garced’s political campaign.

According to the indictment, from December 2019 through June 2020, Vázquez Garced, 62, allegedly engaged in a bribery scheme with Herrera Velutini, Frances Díaz, Rossini and John Blakeman to finance Vázquez Garced’s 2020 gubernatorial election campaign.

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Velutini replied “She has it! In this table she already has 2MM,” then later wrote “But she has to resolve OCIF.”

The indictment alleges that Vázquez Garced accepted the offer of a bribe and, in February 2020, took official action to demand the resignation of OCIF Commissioner A and, in May 2020, to appoint OCIF Commissioner B – a former consultant for the international bank owned by Herrera Velutini – who had been personally selected by Herrera Velutini. In return, Herrera Velutini and Rossini allegedly paid more than $300,000 to political consultants in support of Vázquez Garced’s campaign.

Herrera Velutini, 50, a dual Venezuelan-Italian citizen residing in London, owned an international bank operating in San Juan. Díaz, 50, of Puerto Rico, was the CEO and president of the international bank owned by Herrera Velutini. The bank, which was not identified in the indictment, is Bancrédito International Bank & Trust.

Rossini, 60, of Madrid, Spain, provided consulting services to Herrera Velutini. Blakeman, 53, is a political consultant who worked on Vázquez Garced’s 2020 campaign.

According to the indictment, beginning in 2019, Herrera Velutini’s bank was the subject of an examination by Puerto Rico’s Office of the Commissioner of Financial Institutions (OCIF by its Spanish initials), a regulatory agency that oversees financial institutions operating on the island. Through intermediaries, Herrera Velutini and Rossini allegedly promised to provide funding to support Vázquez Garced’s 2020 gubernatorial election campaign in exchange for Vázquez Garced terminating the commissioner of OCIF, George Richard Joyner, and appointing a new commissioner of Herrera Velutini’s choosing, Víctor Rodríguez Bonilla, who worked at Bancredito.

According to the indictment, Herrera Velutini attended a wedding of an individual identified as Individual C and was seated at the same table as Vázquez Garced. When Blakeman sent a text message to Herrera Velutini seeking support, Herrera

The indictment further alleges that following Vázquez Garced’s primary election loss in August 2020, Herrera Velutini sought to bribe her successor, identified as Public Official A, presumably current Gov. Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia, by offering funding in support of Public Official A’s campaign in exchange for Public Official A ending OCIF’s audit of Herrera Velutini’s bank on terms favorable to Herrera Velutini.

According to the indictment, between April 2021 and August 2021, Herrera Velutini allegedly used intermediaries to convey his offer of a bribe to a witness, presumably Joseph Fuentes Fernández, who held himself out as a representative of Public Official A, but who was in fact acting at the direction of the FBI. As noted in the indictment, the witness was acting at the direction of the FBI during this timeframe and not actually serving as an intermediary of, or acting on behalf of, Public Official A, the officials said.

Governor helps launch emergency response educational campaign

By THE STAR STAFF

Gov. Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia, along with Public Safety (DSP by its Spanish initials) Secretary Alexis Torres Ríos and 9-1-1 Emergency Systems Bureau (NSE) Commissioner Manuel González Azcuy, presented on Tuesday the educational campaign “Dale Paso a la Vida” as an effort to improve the safety and effectiveness of emergency responses in Puerto Rico.

“This is an extremely important initiative because it involves saving lives,” the governor said at a press conference. “The need to carry out this campaign arises from the concerns and needs of our paramedics who are on the street every day facing obstacles, particularly during peak traffic hours. My administration is fully committed to continuing to reduce the response time to emergencies and we will not cease our efforts to achieve this.”.

The initiative seeks to raise awareness among citizens about the importance of making way for emergency vehicles, especially ambulances, thus ensuring quick and safe mobilization to hospitals or emergency scenes. Likewise, the governor announced a salary adjustment in the compensation scale for 9-1-1 telecommunicators. The adjustment is in response to the need to improve the recruitment and retention of these essential professionals, ensuring that they can continue their vital work under the best possible conditions.

to clear the way immediately; one minute can make the difference in saving a life,” Torres Ríos said.

The NSE-911 commissioner stated that “safety and efficiency in emergency responses are fundamental in protecting the lives of our people.”

“With the ‘Dale Paso a la Vida’ campaign, we aspire to create collective awareness about the importance of acting promptly and responsibly on the roads, allowing our emergency teams to carry out their work without impediments,” González Azcuy said.

Medical Emergency Corps Bureau (NCEM) Commissioner Javier Rodríguez Castillo stressed the importance of the campaign, so necessary to help raise awareness among citizens so that they can clear the way for ambulances and first response vehicles.

The DSP secretary said that “for the Department of Public Safety, this educational campaign is of utmost importance to raise awareness among the people of how important it is to make way for the first responders who save lives every day.”

“I urge everyone, whenever you see an ambulance,

“Minutes count when it comes to saving a life. Every second is valuable,” he said. “Our dispatchers and paramedics do everything possible to quickly respond to an emergency situation, but we have seen how on many occasions, the delay is due to someone not taking the sound of the siren and the [emergency vehicle’s flashing] lights seriously. One minute can make the difference between life and death.”

The educational campaign will be disseminated through all media, including press, radio and television, as well as social networks, to reach all people and emphasize the importance of making way for the island’s first responders.

Lawmakers key on complaint response times in LUMA call center visit

By THE STAR STAFF

House Energy Committee Chairman Jesús Hernández Arroyo and Rep. José “Cheito” Hernández Concepción visited the LUMA call center this week to learn about the status of communication between mayors and representatives of the consortium.

They also wanted to learn about the number of complaints received by LUMA, the time it takes to address them, and the difficulties customers face due to the interruption of energy service.

LUMA President & CEO Juan Saca, José Pérez, the company’s legal adviser, Josephine Pozo, director of the Contact Center, and Frances Rodríguez, vice president of communications, were present for the legislators’ visit.

“In this visit, we sought to learn firsthand how complaints are handled when they arrive at LUMA,” Hernández Arroyo emphasized. “Currently, the call center has 218 employees who receive hundreds of breakdown, payment service, and emergency claims daily. Since we are talking about increasing LUMA rates, we

want to ensure that clients receive efficient treatment and service.”

As announced at the hearing, the call centers are located in the towns of Hormigueros, Isabela, Ponce, Aguadilla and San Juan.

According to reports from the director of the call center, by 2023, the calls received had amounted to 216,000, and the emails received had reached 16,000. Pozo said the estimated time for resolving the complaint depends on the region in which the call is made, and in that regard, the brigade determines how long it will take to fix the breakdown.

“The president of LUMA confirmed to us that there are communication problems between the call center and the operational area since once the complaint is opened, the follow-up given to it is not shown,” Hernández Arroyo said. “Based on this information, we corroborated the reason why clients sometimes have to make more than one complaint: they do not receive the update on the first complaint. There are many times that the client waits months without being assisted to resolve a complaint filed at LUMA.”

During the visit, LUMA Energy officials said the company hopes that with some agreements scheduled with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and other capital projects that seek to alleviate the effect of vegetation overgrowth by 40% through pruning, they can somehow resolve the waiting time of customers and complaints can be handled to more promptly.

“I will be attentive to this issue and will

continue to follow up to ensure that each subscriber is attended to with the efficiency and urgency that these cases warrant,” Hernández Arroyo said. “Thousands of customers face different needs and require electricity service, in many cases even to preserve their lives. This is why I am incisive when addressing this issue: in addition to the increase in LUMA rates, the response to the complaints has not been consistent with the agency’s public policy.”

The initiative seeks to raise awareness among citizens about the importance of making way for emergency vehicles, especially ambulances, thus ensuring quick and safe mobilization to hospitals or emergency scenes. (Gov. Pedro Pierluisi/Facebook)

Speaker of the House of Representatives Rafael Hernández Montañez

Businessman pleads guilty in conspiracy to smuggle goods from China

By THE STAR STAFF

Kenneth Fleming and Akua Mosaics Inc. pleaded guilty Tuesday to a conspiracy to smuggle goods from China to avoid paying certain taxes, announced W. Stephen Muldrow, U.S. Attorney for the District of Puerto Rico.

According to the plea agreements, from 2021 through June 2022 Akua Mosaics, which is a South Florida-based firm that maintained an office in Guaynabo that is now closed, and its president, Kenneth Fleming, conspired to defraud the United States by smuggling and clandestinely importing porcelain mosaic tiles manufactured in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), by falsely representing to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) that the merchandise was of Malaysian origin. This was done with the intent to avoid paying antidumping duties of approximately 330.69%, countervailing duties of approximately 358.81%, and other duties of around 25%, which were owed when importing the tiles from the PRC to the United States.

Fleming and Akua Mosaics conspired with Shuyi Mo, a citizen and resident of the PRC, according to the

agreements. Between October 2021 and January 2022, these parties caused a container with porcelain tiles manufactured in the PRC to be shipped from the PRC to Malaysia. They caused “Made in Malaysia” labels to be placed on boxes containing porcelain tiles manufactured in the PRC and then caused a container with porcelain tiles manufactured in the PRC to be shipped from Malaysia to Puerto Rico misrepresenting the country of origin as Malaysia, when in fact, the PRC was the country of origin. The total amount of unpaid duties and tariffs on the shipment was some $1,090,000.

Mo was arrested on April 29, 2023 in the Northern District of California while attempting to leave the United States. He pleaded guilty to his participation in the conspiracy and was sentenced on Sept. 1, 2023 to the approximately four-month term of imprisonment he had served and was removed from the United States.

Fleming and Akua Mosaics face a maximum penalty of five years in prison, a $250,000 fine, a three-year term of supervised release, and a payment of $1,090,000 in restitution. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

Government’s financial reporting woes could delay fiscal board exit

By THE STAR STAFF

Commonwealth auditor KPMG found significant deficiencies in the government’s internal controls over financial reporting during fiscal years (FY) 2020 and 2021, a situation that could prevent the Financial Oversight and Management Board from terminating its tenure in Puerto Rico.

The information is contained in a letter sent by the oversight board to the island Treasury Department. In the March 18 letter to interim Treasury Secretary Nelson Pérez Méndez, board officials expressed concern with the material and significant weaknesses identified in the FY 2020 and FY 2021 management letters by KPMG. Having adequate controls in place is one of the conditions that must be met for the oversight board to be terminated.

Some of the areas that continue to have internal control deficiencies include: Information technology environment; GENTAX reconciliations and interphase with PRIFAS; payroll management at the Police Bureau; capital assets recording; recording of federal funds; accounts payable and pension benefits reconciliation and recording; reconciliation of cash accounts; estimates of accrued compensated absences; and Act 70 benefits.

The weaknesses include that the government performs no periodic evaluations of internal controls and has not taken remedial actions to address most of the control deficiencies identified in previous audits.

The firm also pointed out the repetition of numerous deficiencies identified in previous management letters. For example, KPMG notes that “management is required to de-

Members of the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico

sign and implement effective internal control over financial reporting.”

The lack of internal controls as well as other deficient accounting practices, such as the continued use of manual reconciliation processes, continue to result in the need to make significant audit adjustments to the financial statements.

“The Oversight Board requests that the Puerto Rico Department of Treasury publish the FY2020 and FY2021 management letters and past management letters for the benefit of the people of Puerto Rico and relevant stakeholders,”

the board said in its letter. “We continue to believe that this practice would demonstrate to the public the improvement the government has made in its internal control environment.”

Section 209 of the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act (PROMESA) sets forth the preconditions for the termination of the oversight board.

“The timely preparation and issuance of annual audited financial statements is a critical aspect for meeting those preconditions,” the oversight board said.

The board also said Section 209(1) of PROMESA requires the government to have “adequate access to short-term and long-term credit markets at reasonable rates to meet the borrowing needs of the territorial government.”

As a practical matter, the oversight body said, transparency consistent with municipal regulatory and market standards is one component of regaining market access.

“Accordingly, the Government must produce timely and accurate audited financial reports before it can secure adequate access to credit markets at reasonable rates,” the oversight board said. “The audited financial statements are one of the components that the Oversight Board will rely on to determine if the Government is meeting the balanced budget requirements of PROMESA Section 209(2)(B). The Oversight Board expects the Government to have adequate internal controls over its financial reporting functions so that the information reported in the financial statements is reliable and accurate. It is apparent from the FY2020 and FY2021 Management Letters that the Commonwealth continues to have material and significant deficiencies in internal controls that result in errors and misstatements that need to be adjusted as part of the audit process.”

W. Stephen Muldrow, U.S. Attorney for the District of Puerto Rico

Supreme Court wary of states’ bid to limit federal contact with social media companies

By ADAM LIPTAK

Amajority of the Supreme Court seemed wary earlier this week of a bid by two Republican-led states to limit the Biden administration’s interactions with social media companies, with several justices questioning the states’ legal theories and factual assertions.

Most of the justices appeared convinced that government officials should be able to try to persuade private companies, whether news organizations or tech platforms, not to publish information so long as the requests are not backed by coercive threats.

The dispute was the latest in an extraordinary series of cases this term requiring the justices to assess the meaning of free speech in the internet era.

Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Elena Kagan, both former White House lawyers, said interactions between administration officials and news outlets provided a valuable analogy. Efforts by officials to influence coverage are, they said, part of a valuable dialogue that is not prohibited by the First Amendment.

Members of the court also raised questions about whether the plaintiffs — Missouri and Louisiana, along with five individuals — had suffered the kind of injury that gave them standing to sue. They also suggested that a broad injunction prohibiting contacts between many officials and the platforms was not a proper remedy in any event.

“I don’t see a single item in your briefs that would satisfy our normal tests,” Kagan told J. Benjamin Aguiñaga, Louisiana’s solicitor general.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor accused the states of distorting the record in the case. “I have such a problem with your brief,” she told Aguiñaga. “You omit information that changes the context of some of your claims. You attribute things to people who it didn’t happen to.”

Aguiñaga apologized “if any aspect of our brief was not as forthcoming as it should have been.”

The justices peppered Aguiñaga with hypothetical questions

about national security, doxxing of public officials and contests that could endanger teenagers, all suggesting that there is a role for vigorous efforts by the government to combat harmful speech.

Justice Samuel Alito, the member of the court who appeared most sympathetic to the states’ position, urged his colleagues to remain focused on the case before them.

“Whatever coercion means,” he said, “whatever happened here is sufficient.”

The case arose from a barrage of communications from administration officials urging platforms to take down posts on topics such as the coronavirus vaccines and claims of election fraud. Last year, a federal appeals court severely limited such interactions.

The Supreme Court put that injunction on hold last year while it considered the administration’s appeal. If it were to go into effect, said Brian Fletcher, a lawyer for the government, it would prohibit all sorts of speech, including public comments from the press secretary or other senior officials seeking to discourage posts harmful to children or conveying antisemitic or Islamophobic messages.

He added that the social media companies had been moderating content on their platforms long before they were contacted by officials, had powerful business incentives to do so and were following their own policies. The companies acted independently of the government, he said, and often rejected requests to take down postings.

“These were sophisticated parties,” he said. “They routinely said no to the government. They weren’t open about it. They didn’t hesitate to do it. And when they said no to the govern-

ment, the government never engaged in any sort of retaliation.”

Alito said the volume and intensity of the contacts were troubling, as was the suggestion in some of them that the government and the platforms were partners in an effort to combat misinformation about the pandemic.

Fletcher responded that the messages had to be understood “in the context of an effort to get Americans vaccinated during a once-in-alifetime pandemic” at “a time when thousands of Americans were still dying every week.” The platforms, he added, acknowledged “a responsibility to give people accurate information.”

Aguiñaga presented a different picture of the relationship between the government and the platforms.

“Behind closed doors, the government badgers the platforms 24/7,” he said. “It abuses them with profanity. It warns that the highest levels of the White House are concerned. It ominously says that the White House is considering its options.”

“Under this onslaught,” he added, “the platforms routinely cave.”

The court this term has repeatedly grappled with fundamental questions about the scope of the government’s authority over major technology platforms. On Friday, the court set rules for when government officials can block users from their private social media accounts. Last month, the court considered the constitutionality of laws in Florida and Texas that limit large social media companies from making editorial judgments about which messages to allow.

Those four cases, along with the one Monday, will collectively rebalance the power of the government and powerful technology platforms in the realm of free speech.

A second argument Monday posed a related constitutional question about government power and free speech, though not in the context of social media sites. It concerns whether a state official in New York violated the First Amendment by encouraging companies to stop doing business with the National Rifle Association. The justices appeared to be favoring the gun rights group.

The states in Monday’s first case, Murthy v. Missouri, No. 23-411, did not dispute that the platforms were entitled to make independent decisions about what to feature on their sites. But they said the conduct of government officials in urging them to take down what they say is misinformation amounted to censorship that violated the First Amendment.

A unanimous three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, saying that officials from the White House, the surgeon general’s office, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the FBI had most likely crossed constitutional lines in their bid to persuade platforms to take down posts about what they had flagged as misinformation.

The Supreme Court in Washington, Feb. 28, 2024. The Supreme Court heard arguments Monday on whether the Biden administration violated the First Amendment in combating what it said was misinformation on social media platforms. (Tierney L. Cross/The New York Times)

Trump says Jews who support Democrats ‘hate Israel’ and ‘their religion’

By CHRIS CAMERON

Former President Donald Trump accused Jews who vote for Democrats of hating their religion and Israel, reviving and escalating a claim he made as president that Jewish Democrats were disloyal.

A few hours later, facing mounting criticism from Jewish groups, Trump’s campaign repeated his incendiary charge, declaring that “Trump is right” and that the Democratic Party “has turned into a full-blown anti-Israel, antisemitic, proterrorist cabal.”

Trump made his remarks in an interview published online Monday with Sebastian Gorka, a former White House aide for Trump who now hosts a conservative talk radio program. Gorka asked Trump about criticism that prominent Democrats — including President Joe Biden and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer — had levied against Benjamin Netanyahu, the right-wing prime minister of Israel.

“I actually think they hate Israel,” Trump replied. Gorka agreed.

“Any Jewish person that votes for Democrats hates their religion,” Trump added later. “They hate everything about Israel, and they should be ashamed of themselves because Israel will be destroyed.”

Democratic officials “hate Israel,” he said, because they want votes from people who are sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinians in Gaza, where more than 30,000 people have been killed in the war there.

“Don’t forget, when you see those Palestinian marches — even I am amazed at how many people are in those marches,” Trump said. “And guys like Schumer see that, and to him it’s votes. I think it’s votes more than anything else, because he was always pro-Israel. He’s very anti-Israel now.”

A White House spokesperson described Trump’s com-

Ohio

March 16, 2024. Trump accused Jews who vote for Democrats of hating their religion and Israel, reviving and escalating a claim he made as president that Jewish Democrats were disloyal; the comments echo an antisemitic trope and escalate claims he made as president that were widely criticized. (Maddie McGarvey/The New York Times)

ments as “vile and unhinged antisemitic rhetoric.”

“There is no justification for spreading toxic, false stereotypes that threaten fellow citizens,” said Andrew Bates, a deputy press secretary for Biden, adding that the Biden administration “will never give hate any safe harbor, including today.”

Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the Anti-Defamation League — a Jewish advocacy group — said that “accusing Jews of hating their religion because they might vote for a particular party is defamatory and patently false.”

Schumer called Trump’s remarks “highly partisan and

hateful rants.”

“To make Israel a partisan issue only hurts Israel and the US-Israeli relationship,” Schumer said on social media, adding, “I am working in a bipartisan way to ensure the USIsraeli relationship sustains for generations to come, buoyed by peace in the Middle East.”

Trump had received significant criticism for similar comments he made as president, when he repeatedly accused Jewish voters of disloyalty if they voted for Democrats. Those remarks, and Trump’s comments Monday, evoke an antisemitic trope that Jews have a “dual loyalty” and are often more loyal to Israel than to their own countries.

Jewish Democrats quickly expressed outrage at Trump’s remarks.

“Another day, another depraved antisemitic screed from Donald Trump, who has repeatedly vilified the overwhelmingly majority of American Jews,” Halie Soifer, CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, said on social media. (Jews are considered to be one of the most consistently liberal and Democratic demographics in America.)

Amy Spitalnick, CEO of the liberal Jewish Council for Public Affairs, said on social media that Trump was “further normalizing dangerous antisemites.”

Schumer had, in a carefully worded speech last week, said Netanyahu was an impediment to peace and called for new elections in Israel. The partisan backlash was immediate, with Republicans accusing Schumer of being anti-Israel and of betraying one of America’s closest allies. Trump appeared to latch on to those criticisms but escalated them far beyond what most Republicans have said on the matter.

His remarks to Gorka also followed an incendiary, freewheeling speech in Ohio on Saturday, where he said some migrants are “not people” and that the country would face a “blood bath” if he lost the election in November.

Chief Justice Roberts rejects Navarro’s last-ditch bid to avoid prison

By ADAM LIPTAK

Chief Justice John Roberts ruled earlier this week that Peter Navarro, a trade adviser to Donald Trump during his presidency, must start serving a four-month sentence for contempt of Congress while he pursues an appeal.

The order will make Navarro, who refused to comply with a subpoena seeking information about the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, the first senior aide to Trump to serve time in connection with the plot to overturn the 2020 election. Navarro was ordered to report to a federal prison in Miami on Tuesday.

Roberts, acting on his own without referring the matter to the full Supreme Court, said he saw no reason to disagree with an appeals court’s determination that Navarro had not “met his burden to establish his entitlement to relief.”

The chief justice added that his order applied only to the question of whether Navarro should remain free while he appealed and did not express a view on the appeal itself.

A House committee had sought testimony and documents

from Navarro about his plan to stall the certification of the election by holding up the counting of electoral votes. He refused to comply, saying that Trump had told him to invoke executive privilege.

After Navarro was convicted and sentenced, Judge Amit P. Mehta rejected his request to remain free while on appeal, saying there were no substantial legal questions for the courts to consider. The key point, wrote Mehta, who was appointed by President Barack Obama, was that “the court found no evidence that President Trump ever invoked the privilege.”

A unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit agreed that Navarro, 74, must start serving his sentence. The judges said he “has not shown that his appeal presents substantial questions of law or fact likely to result in reversal, a new trial, a sentence that does not include a term of imprisonment, or a reduced sentence of imprisonment.”

The panel added, in an unsigned opinion, that Navarro had not shown that “the privilege has actually been invoked in this case in some manner by the president.”

In an emergency application asking the Supreme Court to intervene, Navarro’s lawyers said he was not a flight risk or a danger to public safety.

“For the first time in our nation’s history, a senior presidential adviser has been convicted of contempt of Congress after asserting executive privilege over a congressional subpoena,” they wrote.

They added that important legal questions remained unresolved. “Chief among them,” the lawyers wrote, “are whether an ‘affirmative’ invocation of executive privilege was required to preclude a prosecution for contempt of Congress; what was required of former President Trump for a ‘proper’ invocation of privilege; and whether such an invocation required ‘personal consideration,’ all questions of first impression.”

In response, the Justice Department lawyers wrote that Navarro’s arguments were all based on a faulty premise. “Executive privilege belongs to the executive branch, not to an individual present or former employee,” their brief said, “and if the head of that branch declines to assert the privilege, a subordinate cannot do so.”

Former President Donald Trump speaks during a Buckeye Values PAC Rally in Dayton,

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González Colón’s proposal to cut down on permits wait time receives support

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By THE STAR STAFF

Jenniffer González Colón’s proposal for an agile and reliable permit system, which the gubernatorial candidate is promoting as a facilitator for economic development, was welcomed this week by mayors and businessmen who agreed that it would encourage the desire to do business throughout the island and make the permitting process more accessible, especially to small merchants, who are the engine of the local economy.

González Colón said she would confer with U.S. Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) on how that state reduced the waiting time for processing permits to 30 days.

Businessman Juan Antonio “Tony” Larrea, who serves as the liaison with the private sector for González Colón’s campaign, said: “The problem with permits is a priority issue that is consistently brought to me when I have met with private sector organizations and small business owners to discuss the situations that Jenniffer must address from the Governor’s Office.”

“This is a concern that I myself have raised publicly as my own businesses have been affected by the delay in permitting procedures,” he said. “The proposals Jenniffer has presented have been very well received by private industry as they would substantially limit the delay, uncertainty and additional costs incurred in managing the issuance of permits, which are supposed to be issued quickly and efficiently, but are a stumbling block to investment in Puerto Rico.”

Bayamón Mayor Ramón Luis Rivera Cruz noted during a recent press conference that the resident commissioner’s proposal “is very positive for Puerto Rico, not only because it impacts economic development, but it especially helps small and mediumsized businesses, it helps … to eliminate the wait, to eliminate the lines and eliminate the agony with which those permits are issued.”

Every day it takes for a permit to be granted is one less day that a business is being built or operated, Gurabo Mayor Rosachely Rivera Santana said.

“I applaud Jenniffer’s proposal for renewing permit requirements every five years rather than annually, as well as eliminating fees and promoting a one-time fee, as a big step toward improving the agility and management of small and medium-sized busi-

PUERTO RICO STOCKS COMMODITIES

nesses and making it easier for the most vulnerable people who need to manage their permits,” she said.

Manatí Mayor José Sánchez González said the restructuring of the government’s permit system in Puerto Rico “is a crucial step toward the modernization and sustainable progress of our society.”

“By promoting efficiency and transparency in permitting processes, we not only facilitate investment and business development, but also foster job creation and economic growth for small and medium-sized merchants,” he said. “It is imperative that we approach this issue with determination and foresight, recognizing that an agile and fair permitting system is critical to building a prosperous and competitive Puerto Rico on the global stage.”

Several mayors and businessmen agreed that Jenniffer González Colón’s proposal would encourage the desire to do business throughout Puerto Rico and make the permitting process more accessible, especially to small merchants.

Brazil police recommend criminal charges against Bolsonaro

By JACK NICAS

Brazil’s federal police recommended former President Jair Bolsonaro be criminally charged in a scheme to falsify his COVID-19 vaccine card, partly to travel to the United States during the pandemic, in the latest sign of criminal investigations closing in on the former president.

Federal prosecutors will now decide whether to pursue the case. If they do, it will be the first time the former president has faced criminal charges.

Brazilian police accused Bolsonaro of ordering a top aide to obtain falsified COVID vaccination records for himself and his daughter, 13, in late 2022, just before the former president traveled to Florida to stay for three months after his election loss.

Brazilian police said they were awaiting an answer from the U.S. Justice Department on whether Bolsonaro used a fake vaccination card to enter the United States, which could bring different criminal charges. At the time, most international visitors to the U.S. were required to show proof of COVID vaccination to enter the country.

Bolsonaro has said he did not receive a COVID vaccine, but he has denied accusations that he was involved in any plan to falsify his vaccination records. His lawyer said in a text message that he was still reviewing the accusations.

If he is convicted of forging his vaccine card, Bolsonaro could face prison time.

The federal police’s indictment is the first time the various criminal investigations into Bolsonaro have moved toward charges.

Bolsonaro has been subject to questioning and searches as part of several inquiries, including into the selling of watches and jewels he received as presidential gifts from Saudi Arabia and other countries, as well as accusations that he worked with top government officials to hatch a plan to try to hold onto power after his 2022 election loss.

Brazil’s electoral court has already ruled Bolsonaro ineligible for public office until 2030 for spreading false information about Brazil’s voting systems on state television, forcing him to sit out the next presidential contest in 2026.

During the pandemic, Bolsonaro was critical of the COVID vaccine, joking that

Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro gestures during a rally in Sao Paulo, on Sunday, Feb. 25, 2024. Brazil’s federal police recommended that Bolsonaro be criminally charged in connection with a scheme to falsify his COVID-19 vaccine card, in part to travel to the United States during the pandemic. If federal prosecutors decide to pursue the charges, it would be the first time the former president has faced criminal charges. (Victor Moriyama/The New York Times)

it would turn people into crocodiles and instead promoting unproven treatments, such as hydroxychloroquine, an antimalarial drug.

His administration hesitated to secure vaccines when they were first being distributed, exacerbating the pandemic in Brazil, according to a Brazilian congressional investigation that recommended in 2021 that the former president be charged with “crimes against humanity,” among other charges, for his actions during the pandemic.

Prosecutors at the time did not charge him. More than 700,000 people have died in Brazil because of COVID, the secondhighest national death count after the United States.

In May 2023, police searched Bolsonaro’s home, confiscated his cellphone and arrested one of his closest aides and two of his security guards as part of the investigation into the fake vaccination records.

In a complaint unsealed Tuesday, Brazil’s federal police said records showed that Bolsonaro’s personal aide, Lt. Col. Mauro Cid, and Cid’s wife used fake vaccination cards to enter the United States in 2022. Cid, who was arrested last year as

part of the investigation, told police that once Bolsonaro found out Cid had a fake vaccine card, he ordered the aide to get him one, too, police said.

Police said records showed that on Dec. 21, 2022, an official in a suburb of Rio de Janeiro then entered false records into the city’s health database that Bolsonaro and his daughter had received two doses of Pfizer’s COVID vaccine earlier

that year. Police said that during one of the two dates on which the records said Bolsonaro received a vaccine, the former president was not in the Rio de Janeiro suburb.

In addition to Cid, police said, several other allies of the former president falsified vaccination records in a similar scheme, some of whom used the records to accompany Bolsonaro to the United States. Police also recommended charges against them.

Bolsonaro spent his first three months after the presidency staying in a rented home near Disney World outside Orlando.

Bolsonaro entered the United States several other times while the country required visitors to show proof of vaccination, including to attend the U.N. General Assembly and to meet President Joe Biden in Los Angeles, though those 2022 trips preceded the plan described by investigators to falsify vaccine records.

In 2021, Bolsonaro, who was perhaps the only unvaccinated world leader at the U.N. General Assembly, opened that proceeding with a speech that said Brazil would not require anyone to get vaccinated. He added that he had recovered from COVID by using “off-label” drugs.

“History and science will hold everyone accountable,” he said.

During that trip, he and his entourage struggled to enter New York restaurants that required proof of vaccination. Instead, he posted a photo of his team eating pizza on the sidewalk. Bolsonaro’s health minister, who was biting a piece of pizza in the photo, tested positive for COVID hours after attending the U.N. meetings.

Food experts predict ‘imminent’ famine in northern Gaza

By GAYA GUPTA, SHASHANK BENGALI and THOMAS FULLER

The acute food shortage in the warravaged Gaza Strip has become so severe that “famine is imminent” and the enclave is on the verge of a “major acceleration of deaths and malnutrition,” a report from a global authority on food security and nutrition said earlier this week.

The group, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification global initiative, which was set up in 2004 by U.N. agencies and international relief groups, has sounded the alarm about famine only twice before: in Somalia in 2011 and in South Sudan in 2017.

The warning came as Israeli forces again raided Shifa Hospital in the northern part of the enclave Monday, in an operation that they said had been aimed at senior Hamas officials who had regrouped on the premises, setting off an hourslong battle that both sides said had resulted in casualties.

The raid at Shifa, in Gaza City, raised questions about the level of control that Israeli forces have over northern Gaza. In December, the Israeli military said it was nearing “full operational control” there.

Taken together, the fighting and the severe food shortage underlined the chaos and desperation in Gaza after 23 weeks of war. U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres renewed his call Monday for “an immediate humanitarian cease-fire” and said that the report on imminent famine was “an appalling indictment of conditions on the ground for civilians.”

As Israeli negotiators arrived in Qatar for a new round of talks on a cease-fire and the release of hostages held by Hamas and its allies, President Joe Biden had a phone conversation with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel on Monday, according to Jake Sullivan, the president’s national security adviser.

Biden relayed that he was “deeply concerned” about the prospect of Israel’s next phase in the war, an incursion into the southern Gazan city of Rafah, which is filled with families displaced from other parts of the territory, Sullivan said during a news briefing.

Netanyahu agreed to send a team of military and humanitarian officials to Washington to hear the administration’s concerns, according to Sullivan. Biden, who asked Netanyahu for the visit, also requested that the Israeli delegation offer an

A global authority on food security said that in the coming months, as many as 1.1 million people in Gaza could face the most severe levels of hunger.

alternative proposal to target senior Hamas leaders without a major invasion.

The call occurred as the global initiative’s report stressed that as many as 1.1 million people in Gaza would most likely experience “catastrophic” shortages of food. The group said the continued fighting and aid organizations’ lack of access to northern Gaza, the first part of the territory that Israeli forces invaded in October after the attack by Hamas, had made conditions particularly acute there.

Eylon Levy, an Israeli government spokesperson, pushed back on the report, calling it an “out-of-date picture” that “does not take into account the latest developments on the ground,” including major humanitarian initiatives last week. He also said that Israel was taking “proactive measures” to expand aid delivery in northern Gaza.

In recent weeks, some foreign leaders have been increasingly blunt in blaming Israel for the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza. At the opening of a conference on humanitarian aid for Gaza in Brussels, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, accused Israel of “provoking famine.”

Starvation is being used as “a weapon of war,” he said.

Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, rejected Borrell’s criticism, saying that the country allowed extensive aid in by air,

land and sea.

Across the Gaza Strip, the severe shortages of food and other basic goods come amid Israeli’s bombardment and a near-total blockade. The central and southern parts of the territory also face a risk of famine by July if the worst-case scenarios come to pass, the Integrated Food Security group said.

In December, the group said that famine could occur within six months in Gaza unless the fighting stopped immediately and more humanitarian supplies made it into the territory. “Since then, the conditions necessary to prevent famine have not been met,” the report said.

The vast majority of the people in Gaza have been forced from their homes by the war, and many were once again on the move Monday after the Israeli military ordered civilians to leave the area near Shifa Hospital.

The military said it had launched the Monday raid on the hospital based on new intelligence that Hamas officials were operating from the facilities. It came four months after Israeli forces stormed the complex and found a tunnel shaft they said supported their contention that the armed group had used it to conceal military operations. Since then, Israel has withdrawn many troops from northern Gaza and has shifted the focus of its invasion to the south.

The military said its forces killed 20 militants during the operations Monday, including a senior Hamas official it identified as Faiq Mabhouh, the head of operations for the internal security forces of the Hamas government in Gaza. He was “armed and hiding in a compound” at the hospital, Israel said.

(Sullivan confirmed Monday that Israel had also killed Hamas’ deputy commander, Marwan Issa, this month.)

Israel has said that the hospital complex doubles as a Hamas military command center, calling it one of many examples of civilian facilities that militants use to shield their activities. U.S. spy agencies have said their own intelligence indicates that Hamas and another Palestinian group used Shifa to command forces and hold some hostages taken during the Oct. 7 attacks.

The hospital and the surrounding area also house about 30,000 patients, medical workers and displaced civilians, and a number of people were killed and wounded in the raid Monday, the Gaza Health Ministry said.

By midday, about 15 Israeli tanks and several bulldozers were on the hospital’s grounds, said Alaa Abu al-Kaas, who was staying at the hospital with her father, who was being treated.

“The fear and terror are really eating us alive,” she said in a phone call from a corridor of one of the hospital’s buildings where she was hiding. Her voice was barely audible amid loud booms and explosions.

Al-Kaas, 19, said that in the predawn hours Monday, she heard shots and the sound of tanks before Israeli soldiers, using loudspeakers, ordered people in the complex to stay inside and close the windows. She said Israeli forces told people that they would be moved to the area of Mawasi in southern Gaza, although it was not immediately clear when or how. Israel said it had sought to create a humanitarian “safe zone” in Mawasi, although civilians have found little shelter there.

Al-Kaas said she had also seen Israeli soldiers holding several people, their hands bound and clothes partly stripped off, in the courtyard of the hospital complex. She added that bodies of people who had apparently been shot were lying in the courtyard. Her account could not be independently confirmed.

“We are just sitting here,” she said, “waiting for them to evacuate us out of here.”

The internet is a wasteland, so give kids better places to go

By MICHELLE GOLDBERG

In January, I had the odd experience of nodding along with Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who can usually be relied on to be wrong, as he berated supervillain Mark Zuckerberg, head of Facebook’s parent company, Meta, about the effect its products have on kids. “You have blood on your hands,” Graham said.

That evening, I moderated a panel on social media regulation whose participants included New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, a progressive crusader and perhaps Donald Trump’s single most effective antagonist. Her position wasn’t that different from that of Graham. There is a correlation, she pointed out, between the proliferation of addictive social media algorithms and the collapse of young people’s mental health, including rising rates of depression, suicidal thoughts and self-harm.

“And I’ve seen that for myself,” she said, describing helping the family of a young girl find a scarce psychiatric bed during the pandemic. “She talked to me a lot about social media.”

Because alarm over what social media is doing to kids is broad and bipartisan, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt is pushing on an open door with his important new book, “The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness.” The shift in kids’ energy and attention from the physical world to the virtual

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one, Haidt shows, has been catastrophic, especially for girls. Female adolescence was nightmarish enough before smartphones, but apps like Instagram and TikTok have put popularity contests and unrealistic beauty standards into hyperdrive. (Boys, by contrast, have more problems linked to overuse of video games and porn.) The studies Haidt cites — as well as the ones he debunks — should put to bed the notion that concern over kids and phones is just a modern moral panic akin to previous generations’ hand-wringing over radio, comic books and television.

But I suspect that many readers won’t need convincing. The question in our politics is less whether these ubiquitous new technologies are causing widespread psychological damage than what can be done about it.

So far, the answer has been not much. The federal Kids Online Safety Act, which was recently revised to allay at least some concerns about censorship, has the votes to pass the Senate but hasn’t even been introduced in the House. In the absence of federal action, both red and blue states have tried to enact their own laws to safeguard kids online, but many have been enjoined by courts for running afoul of the First Amendment. Lawmakers in New York are working on a bill that tries to rein in predatory social media apps while respecting free speech; it targets the algorithms that social media companies use to serve kids ever more extreme content, keeping them glued to their phones. But while the law seems likely to pass, no one knows whether courts will uphold it.

There are, however, small but potentially significant steps local governments can take right now to get kids to spend less time online, steps that raise no constitutional issues. Phonefree schools are an obvious start, although, in a perverse American twist, some parents object to them because they want to be able to reach their kids if there’s a mass shooting. More than that, we need a lot more places — parks, food courts, movie theaters, even video arcades — where kids can interact in person.

In “The Anxious Generation,” Haidt argues that while kids are underprotected on the internet, they’re overprotected in the real world, and that these two trends work in tandem. For a whole host of reasons — parental fear, overzealous child welfare departments, car-centric city planning — kids generally have a lot less freedom and independence than their parents did. Sitting at home in front of screens may keep them safe from certain physical harms, but it leaves them more vulnerable to psychological ones.

Reading Haidt’s book, I kept thinking of a park in Paris’ Les Halles district where adults aren’t allowed, and how much easier it would be to keep kids off the internet if there were similar parks scattered around American cities and towns. I would much rather have my own children, who are 9 and 11, roaming the neighborhood than spending hours interacting with friends remotely on apps like Roblox.

But it’s hard to make them go outside when there are no other kids around. One of my favorite days of the year is my Brooklyn neighborhood’s block party, when the street

A teenager spends time on the TikTok app on her phone at a mall in Miami, March 15, 2024. We need to give kids better places to go than online, writes the New York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg. (Damon Winter/The New York Times)

is closed to traffic and the kids play in packs, most ignored by their tipsy parents. It demonstrates how the right physical environment can encourage offscreen socializing.

As I was finishing “The Anxious Generation,” a book that partly overlaps with it arrived in the mail: “Family Unfriendly: How Our Culture Made Raising Kids Much Harder Than It Needs to Be.” The author, Timothy P. Carney, is a conservative Catholic father of six who wants to encourage other people to have lots of kids. He and I agree about very little, but we’re in complete accord about the need for communities to be “kid-walkable and kid-bikeable” so that children will have more real-world autonomy. Carney cites a 2023 paper from The Journal of Pediatrics concluding that a “primary cause of the rise in mental disorders is a decline over decades in opportunities for children and teens to play, roam and engage in other activities independent of direct oversight and control by adults.”

If we want to start getting kids offline, we need to give them better places to go instead.

Manuel Sierra General Manager

Solicitan aumento en el presupuesto para subsidiar salario de agricultores en la Isla

POR EL STAR STAFF

SAN JUAN – La Comisión de Hacienda de la Cámara de Representantes continuó el martes, las vistas públicas sobre la Resolución Conjunta de la Cámara 624 que busca asignar $13,062 al fondo general para gastos ordinarios de funcionamiento de los programas y agencias que componen la Rama Ejecutiva y los programas que componen la Rama Judicial y la Rama Legislativa durante el año fiscal que concluye el 30 de junio de 2024.

A la audiencia pública compareció el Departamento de Agricultura representada por su secretario, Ramón González Beiró.

Durante el encuentro legislativo, González Beiró expuso que para el año fiscal 2024 el Departamento cuenta con un presupuesto consolidado de $39.4 millones aunque habían solicitado un presupuesto de $86 millones.

En cuanto al año fiscal 2025, la agencia solicitó un presupuesto de $65.3, sin embargo la cantidad sugerida es de $25.4 millones.

A preguntas del presidente de la Comisión de Agricultura, Jorge Alfredo Rivera Segarra, sobre qué pasaría si no se aprueban los $65.3 millones que solicitó la agencia para el próximo año fiscal, González Beiró dijo que ‘’siempre y cuando se apruebe un presupuesto parecido al vigente de los $39.4 millones, el Departamento va a operar sin problemas’’.

No obstante, González Beiró aseguró que si no lo-

gran tener el presupuesto que solicitaron en cada uno de los Departamentos consolidados a la agencia, los agricultores se verán afectados.

De igual forma, González Beiró indicó que están solicitando $17.5 millones mediante la Administración para el Desarrollo de Empresas Agropecuarias (ADEA) para cubrir las partidas de subsidios salariales sobre las reclamaciones trimestrales de los agricultores.

“Estamos trabajando con OGP para llevar el subsidio general que hoy día contamos con $24 millones y la realidad del asunto es que para poder pagar el 100% de lo que solicitan los agricultores, necesitamos $41.5 millones así que ni tan siquiera estamos pagando el 50% de lo que deberíamos pagarle a cada agricultor. Para poder hacerlo necesitamos esos $17.5 millones’’, alertó González Beiró.

Por su parte, Rivera Segarra destacó que ‘’esto es

lo que tenemos que discutir en estas oportunidades y ante eso, no podemos corrernos el riesgo de que se eliminen partidas que ya tiene el Departamento. Cada programa es importante, no es un gasto, es una inversión y hay que defender ante la Junta de Control Fiscal y cualquier foro el presupuesto de esta agencia que es crucial y determinante para el futuro de la Isla’’.

Asimismo, González Beiró indicó que cuentan con un ‘’grave problema’’ en la mano de obra. ‘’Hace años ese problema se veía más en la zona montañosa con el café y hoy día ese problema es en la Isla completa incluyendo las vaquerías y las hortalizas’’.

“Para remediar este problema por eso es tan importante contar con la partida de los $17.5 millones para el subsidio salarial y hacerle justicia a cada uno de estos agricultores’’, agregó.

Este sería el cuarto presupuesto balanceado que se aprueba durante este cuatrienio desde que entró en vigor la Ley Promesa y luego de reestructurar la deuda del gobierno central mediante la Ley 53-2021, conocida como la “Ley para Ponerle Fin a la Quiebra de Puerto Rico”.

En abril, las vistas públicas continuarán el día 4 de ese mes con el Departamento de Transportación y Obras Públicas (DTOP), y la Autoridad de Carreteras; el 9 con el Departamento de Seguridad Pública (DSP) y sus negociados; y el 11 con el Departamento de Desarrollo Económico y Comercio (DDEC), la Compañía de Turismo (CT) y la Administración de Servicios Generales (ASG).

CST solicita propuestas para proyectos educativos o de aplicación de ley para la seguridad vial

POR CYBERNEWS

SAN JUAN – La Comisión para la Seguridad en el Tránsito (CST) comenzó el período de recibir propuestas para el desarrollo de proyectos educativos o de aplicación de ley sobre la seguridad vial que tengan como objetivo la prevención de choques y reducción de fatalidades en la Isla, según informó su director ejecutivo Luis Rodríguez Díaz.

La CST estará recibiendo propuestas hasta el lunes, 15 de abril de 2024. Estas deben ser enmarcadas en algunos de los siguientes temas: evitar conducir bajos los efectos del alcohol o droga, respetar los límites de velocidad y no ser agresivo al conducir, uso de correcto del asiento protector, uso del cinturón, seguridad del peatón y del ciclista, seguridad de motociclistas y sobre evitar la distracción al conducir.

Estas propuestas pueden ser presentadas por ins-

tituciones sin fines de lucro, municipios, agencias gubernamentales y corporaciones públicas; y las que sean aprobadas serán efectivas para el próximo año fiscal federal que comienza el 1 de octubre de 2024 hasta el 30 de septiembre de 2025.

“Hemos abierto el proceso para que sea más participativo y competitivo. De esta manera, buscamos fomentar el desarrollo de nuevos proyectos que fortalezcan la cultura de seguridad vial en la Isla. Las propuestas presentadas deben establecer un problema de seguridad vial con datos sustentables y detallar la solución que incluya las metas, objetivos y estrategias que puedan ser medibles y cuantificables”, indicó Rodríguez Díaz en declaraciones escritas.

Aquellas propuestas que sean aprobadas se incluirán como parte del Plan de Seguridad Vial aprobado por la National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) para el año fiscal federal 2024-2025.

Para solicitar el formulario de propuesta puede escribir a propuestasfederales@cst.pr.gov o llamar al 787-721-4142.

‘Masters of the Air’ review: Hanks and Spielberg, back at war

By MIKE HALE

This review contains spoilers for the entire season of “Masters of the Air.”

When Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg created “Band of Brothers” in 2001, in the wake of their partnership on the 1998 film “Saving Private Ryan,” they were the most prominent celebrators of what had become known as the Greatest Generation. Twenty-three years later, with the release of “Masters of the Air,” they’ve become their own greatest generation: upholders of an old-fashioned style of television making, fighting their chosen war over and over again.

Created by John Shiban and John Orloff based on Donald L. Miller’s book of the same title, “Masters of the Air” — which wrapped up its nine-episode run on Apple TV+ last week — was Hanks and Spielberg’s third miniseries saluting U.S. troops in World War II. (Gary Goetzman joined them as executive producer for “The Pacific” in 2010 and for “Masters.”) The latest band of brothers chosen for dramatization and valorization was the 100th Bomb Group, the “bloody Hundredth,” based in England and decimated during its daytime runs over Europe from 1943 to 1945.

ma, the aerial-combat blockbuster, the POW escape adventure, the behind-enemy-lines spy thriller, the racial harmony drama — strung together in fealty to actual events but with disregard for dramatic development.

The first — and for many viewers, perhaps, sufficient — observation to be made about “Masters” is that the money, more than ever, was right up there on the screen. These producers are Dwight D. Eisenhower-class when it comes to marshaling staff and materiel, as evidenced by the solid five minutes of closing credits, and both the quotidian re-creation of an air base in the green English countryside and the special-effects extravaganzas of airborne battle were visually captivating.

Some of the images of mayhem in the skies as the U.S. B-17s and their crews are torn apart by German flak and fighters were the kind that will stick with you even if you would rather they didn’t, such as the rain of wings and engines slowly falling after two bombers collide or such as the airman sliding through the sky and being halved by a plane’s wing.

But being absorbingly pictorial (the distinguished roster of directors included Cary Joji Fukunaga, Dee Rees, Tim Van Patten, and the team of Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck) only contributed to the sense that the show existed in amber — more of a well-preserved fossil than a compelling drama. You could argue that this was the inevitable result of trying to celebrate 1940s-style patriotism one time too many. But the issues with “Masters” are artistic rather than cultural or political or factual.

In condensing Miller’s broad-ranging history while also converting it into a drama extending over nearly eight hours, Orloff and Shiban ended up with an ungainly, disjointed story that never gave itself the time or the space to grow. “Masters” felt like a catalog of war movie genres — the homefront melodra-

To be fair, the satisfaction offered by “Band of Brothers” and, to a lesser extent, “The Pacific” had to do in part with a focus on groups of men enduring a particular gantlet of action together. The history behind “Masters,” more diffuse geographically and temporally, was certainly more difficult to adapt. But Orloff and Shiban make choices that are in some cases puzzling, in others explicable but dramatically wrongheaded.

A female British soldier — vividly played by Bel Powley — is revealed to be a spy, last seen walking down a street in occupied Paris, and then completely disappears from the show, fate unknown. The Tuskegee Airmen, who are African American military pilots, appear out of nowhere in the next-to-last episode as if the reels had gotten mixed up; several of them end up in a prison camp with the show’s white main characters, and one is centrally involved in planning an escape before they, too, are dropped from the action. A downed pilot rescued by the Russians happens upon an abandoned concentration camp littered with corpses, in a brief scene with a dreary sense of obligation.

The primary narrative, centered on pilots Buck Cleven (Austin Butler) and Bucky Egan (Callum Turner), also takes a tortuous path. It’s easy to see why you would want to build the story around the best friends Cleven and Egan, with their harmonious nicknames and sterling records of service. But the facts dictate that partway through the series, both ditch their planes and are taken prisoner, radically changing the feel and look of the show in a way that attenuates the drama and diminishes the emotional investment the viewer has been building.

Those events could have been shaped artfully, but “Masters” doesn’t manage it.

Cleven’s initial disappearance occurs off screen and

without explanation, setting up a surprise prison-camp reunion with Egan several episodes later; it may match real events, but on screen, it feels manipulative and obvious. Neither that meeting nor their second reunion back at the air base has the emotional force it should have; the moments feel like boxes being checked.

Contributing to the general sense of disorganization, the show doesn’t do a good job of differentiating and particularizing the members of its large cast, as airmen die by the hundreds and replacements are brought in. Especially in the aerial scenes, behind oxygen masks and goggles, the crew members are hard to sort out, adding a layer of confusion that makes it harder to be invested in their fates.

The unfortunate thing about “Masters” is that it isn’t doing what it should for some of the actors in the cast, the way “Band of Brothers” showcased Damian Lewis and Ron Livingston. Butler and especially Turner are fine performers, and they’re wonderful to watch in the early episodes as the 100th arrives in England, prepares for battle and embarks on its disastrous early missions.

Butler’s reserved charisma and Turner’s witty, sparklingyet-barbed energy play off each other in an absorbing and moving way, and you want to see where the toll of the nightmarish bombing runs takes them. (Nate Mann is also excellent in the more one-dimensional role of the dedicated replacement pilot Robert Rosenthal, who picks up the narrative slack after Cleven and Egan go down.)

Once they’re in the German camps, though, playing out familiar contraband-radio and clandestine-plotting scenarios, the life goes out of their performances and out of the series as a whole. Butler and Turner deserved better, but Egan and Cleven, who died in 1961 and 2006, respectively, get their due in the scene many viewers probably care about most: the biographical denouement showing their real faces and detailing their postwar lives. Even with Hanks and Spielberg involved, when you put history right next to fiction, history tends to win.

It’s easy to see why you would want to build the story around the best friends Cleven and Egan, with their harmonious nicknames and sterling records of service.

A multitasker’s guide to regaining focus

By ANNA BORGES

Multitasking is just the way many of us live. How often do you text while stuck in traffic, lose track of a podcast while doing chores, or flutter between the news and your inbox?

“We get stuck in this multitasking trap even without realizing that we’re doing it,” said Nicole Byers, a neuropsychologist in Calgary, Alberta, who specializes in treating people with burnout.

There are a few reasons for our collective habit, she added. Most of us avoid boredom if we can, Byers explained, and multitasking is a reliable way to ward it off.

There’s also a lot of pressure to do it. “How many times have we seen a job posting that says, ‘Must be an excellent multitasker’?” she asked. “Our modern world — where so many of us spend most of the day on screens — really forces our brain to multitask.”

We can’t really do more than one thing at a time, experts say. But these tactics can help. (Henri Campeã/The New York Times)

The fact remains that we’re not great at doing it, and it’s not great for us. But there are ways we can be smarter in our approach.

Your brain on multitasking

First, “multitask” itself is typically a misnomer. According to experts, it’s not possible to do two things at once — unless we can do one without much thinking (like taking a walk while catching up with a friend).

“Usually, when people think they’re multitasking, they’re actually switching their attention back and forth between two separate tasks,” said Gloria Mark, a professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine, and author of “Attention Span: A Groundbreaking Way to Restore Balance, Happiness and Productivity.”

Let’s consider what happens when you engage in a single task like cooking dinner. From the moment you decide what to make, different regions of your brain, collectively referred to as the cognitive control network, collaborate to make it happen, said Anthony Wagner, a professor of psychology at Stanford and the deputy director of the university’s Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute.

Andeno Co

Tasa mínima, promedio ponderado, y máxima para préstamos personales pequeños otorgados para la semana que terminó el sábado, 16 de marzo de 2024

This network includes areas of your brain that are involved in executive function, or the ability to plan and carry out goal-oriented behavior. Together they create a mental model of the job at hand and what you need to accomplish it. Your brain might do this, Wagner said, by drawing on both external and internal information, like the ingredients in your fridge or your memory of the recipe.

Mark compared this process to drawing on a mental whiteboard. But if your friend calls you to rant about her day, that whiteboard gets wiped clean. “Every time you switch your attention to a new task, your brain has to reorient itself,” she said.

If you know the dish like the back of your hand or your chat is nice and breezy, switching might be simple. But the more effort each task takes, the more your brain has to sort through competing information and separate goals.

The downsides of multitasking

As you would probably expect, the potential harm varies depending on the activity and how adept you are at doing it. But, generally, “when we switch between tasks, we pay what’s been dubbed a ‘switch cost,’” Wagner said. “We’re going to be slower and less accurate than we would have been if we stayed on a single task.”

Speed and precision aren’t the only risks, either. Multitasking is more cognitively demanding, even when we’re doing things we find enjoyable or easy. When we multitask, we can tax our working memory, or our ability to hold and handle information in our mind, Byers explained. “The more we overload that system and the more we’re trying to keep in our brains at once, the more mental fatigue it can lead to,” she said. And other studies have found that multitasking can set our heart racing, raise our blood pressure, trigger anxiety, dampen our mood and negatively impact our perception of

the work at hand.

How to focus on one thing at a time

Mark suggested you start by observing yourself throughout the day, noticing when and how you task-switch without realizing it. From there, the advice is simple yet challenging: You’ll need to practice monotasking, or doing one thing at a time, to gradually retrain your focus and build your tolerance.

Monotasking might be easiest during times when you mentally perform best, Mark said. It differs from person to person, but in one workplace study, she and her colleagues found that most people’s ability to tackle challenging work peaked around midmorning and midafternoon.

If you’re struggling, start small. Can you monotask for five minutes? How about 10?

“When it comes to our brains, slow and steady is always a good strategy,” Byers said.

When to keep multitasking

Your life is probably going to include some level of task-switching, but there are ways to be more intentional about it.

Stick to your strengths. Certain activities “strain our systems and drain our brain power more or less than others,” Byers said. So if a task is stressful or requires a lot of mental effort when doing it solo, you probably won’t be better off multitasking. For example, you might be good at crocheting while watching TV, but a beginner might need full concentration to avoid skipping stitches.

Weigh the risks. Some tasks might feel like second nature, but there are still times when you want your wits about you. “Even if we feel able to do something without paying much attention, we cannot predict the unpredictable nature of the world,” Wagner said. “Highly skilled drivers can’t anticipate when a car will swerve into your lane.”

The stakes don’t have to be life or death for multitasking to be not worth it: It can leave the door open for serious mistakes at work or stop you from being as present as you want to be at home.

Find break points. When and how we switch tasks matters, too. Rather than pivoting at the drop of a distraction, Mark suggested swapping at what she called “break points,” places in your work flow where it will be “easy to pick it up again without having to do redundant work.” As you read this article you might try getting to the end before checking your notifications. If that’s not possible, you might aim for at least the end of this paragraph.

Use multitasking when it actually helps. Stacking habits, particularly activities you like with ones you don’t, can give your brain more positive reinforcement than monotasking alone. If, for instance, you’re more likely to do the dishes with the TV on, it’s probably worth sacrificing a bit of attention. “Our brains may not like change,” Byers said. “But they do really like rewards.”

The San Juan Daily Star

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBU-

NAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA

CENTRO JUDICIAL DE PONCE SALA SUPERIOR BAUTISTA REO PR CORP.

Demandante V.

SUCESIÓN DE FÉLIX

LUIS LLORENS SANTINI

T/C/C FÉLIX LLORENS

SANTINI COMPUESTA

POR NORA LLORENS RANGEL, ÓSCAR

LLORENS RANGEL, JACKELINE LLORENS RANGEL, FÉLIX

LLORENS RANGEL, GERARDO LLORENS

VEGA, Y FULANO DE TAL Y FULANA DE TAL; SUCESIÓN DE IVONNE CELESTE

ALICEA FIGUEROA

T/C/C IVONNE ALICEA

FIGUEROA COMPUESTA

POR SUTANO DE TAL

Y SUTANA DE TAL; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA

Demandados

CIVIL NÚM.: PO2022CV02964 (406) SOBRE: cobro de dinero Y EJECUCIÓN DE PRENDA E hipoteca. AVISO DE SUBASTA.

ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA. EL PRESIDENTE DE

LOS EE.UU. EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO

RICO. SS. YO, el (la) Alguacil que suscribe, por la presente anuncia y hace constar que en cumplimiento del Mandamiento de Ejecución de Sentencia, expedido el 16 de enero de 2024 por la Secretaría de este Tribunal, procederé a vender en pública subasta y al mejor postor, quien pagará el importe de la venta en dinero efectivo o en cheque certificado o de gerente, a la orden del Alguacil suscribiente, en moneda del curso legal de los Estados Unidos de América, el día 4 de abril de 2024, a la(s) 11:15 de la mañana, en las oficinas del Alguacil del Tribunal de Ponce, todo título, derecho o interés que corresponda a la parte demandada sobre el inmueble que se describe a continuación: UR-

BANA: Solar número seis (6) del Plano de Inscripción de la Urbanización Jacaranda radicado en el Barrio Machuelo Arriba, Municipio de Ponce, que según las medidas que aparecen de dicho Plano de Inscripción tiene un área superficial de novecientos noventa y nueve punto noventa y cuatro metros cuadrados (999.94 mc), en colindancias por el Norte, con el solar número siete (7), por don-

Wednesday, March 20, 2024 15

de mide cincuenta punto cero cero metros (50.00 m); por el Sur, con el solar número cinco (5), por donde mide cincuenta punto cero cero metros (50.00 m); por el Este, con terrenos de Glenview Gardens, por donde mide veinte punto cero cero metros (20.00 m); y por el Oeste, con la Calle B de la Urbanización, por donde mide veinte punto cero cero metros (20.00 m). En este solar enclava una casa de hormigón reforzado y bloques, dedicada a vivienda. Finca número 29,410, inscrita al folio 151 del tomo 1021 de Ponce, Registro de la Propiedad de Ponce, Sección I. Dirección Física: Urb. Jacaranda, D6 Calle B, Ponce, PR 00726. La propiedad descrita anteriormente está afecta a los siguientes gravámenes: Afecta por su procedencia: Servidumbre a favor de la Autoridad de Acueductos y Alcantarillados, Autoridad de las Fuentes Fluviales, Puerto Rico Telephone Company, Municipio de Ponce, condiciones restrictivas y servidumbre a favor de las fincas 24,447 y 24,597. Por sí: HIPOTECA: En garantía de un pagaré a favor de Doral Bank, o a su orden, por la suma de $179,400.00, con interés al 7.75% anual, y vencedero a la demanda, constituida por los titulares registrales mediante la escritura #28, otorgada en Ponce, Puerto Rico, el día 29 de abril de 2005, ante el Notario Público Fernando J. Rovira Rullán, inscrita al folio 186 del tomo 2034 de Ponce, finca #29410, inscripción 14a. EMBARGO FEDERAL:

Contra Félix Llorens Santini, bajo el #313770906, presentado y anotado el 13 de septiembre de 2006, al folio 102 del asiento 4 del libro de embargos federales #6 de Ponce, Sección I, por la cantidad de $34,206.54.

EMBARGO FEDERAL: Contra Félix Llorens Santini, bajo el #367509907, presentado y anotado el 5 de julio de 2007 al folio 160 del asiento 5 del libro de embargos federales #6 de Ponce, Sección I, por la cantidad de $22,255.19. EMBARGO: A favor de ELA de PR, Ley 12, para responder por la suma de $74,679.29 por concepto de contribución sobre ingresos, según certificación del 21 de septiembre de 2010, anotado el 15 de octubre del 2010 al folio 112 orden 445 del tomo I de Embargos Ley 12 de Ponce I.

EMBARGO: A favor de ELA de PR, Ley 12, para responder por la suma de $92,207.33 por concepto de contribución sobre ingresos, según certificación del 24 de febrero de 2011, anotado el 1 de marzo del 2011 al folio 175 orden 693 del tomo I de Embargos Ley 12 de Ponce I.

EMBARGO FEDERAL: Contra

Félix Llorens Santini, bajo el #928050013, presentado y anotado el 26 de marzo del 2013 al folio 75 del asiento 2 del libro de embargos federales # 9 de Ponce, Sección I, por la cantidad de $ 3,227.48. AVISO DE DEMANDA: En el Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala de Ponce, en el caso Civil #JCD2013-0537, seguido por Doral Bank, demandante vs. Bufete Llorens Santini, Félix Luis Llorens Santini e Ivonne Celeste Alicea Figueroa, demandados, donde se solicita el pago de la deuda garantizada con la hipoteca relacionada en la inscripción 14a, reducida a $67,250.75, anotada al folio 186 del tomo 2034 de Ponce, finca # 29410, el día 7 de marzo del 2014, Anotación A. Según pactado en la Escritura de Hipoteca Número 28, otorgada en Ponce, Puerto Rico, el día 29 de abril de 2005, ante el Notario Público Fernando J. Rovira Rullán, que es objeto de este procedimiento, servirá de tipo mínimo para la primera subasta de la propiedad descrita la suma de $215,280.00. De no adjudicarse la propiedad en la primera subasta, se celebrará una segunda subasta, en las oficinas del Alguacil del Tribunal de Ponce, el día 11 de abril de 2024, a la(s) 11:15 de la mañana. El tipo mínimo para la segunda subasta será dos terceras partes (2/3) del tipo mínimo de la primera subasta, o sea, $143,520.00. De no adjudicarse la propiedad en la segunda subasta, se celebrará una tercera subasta en en las oficinas del Alguacil del Tribunal de Ponce, el día 18 de abril de 2024, a la(s) 11:15 de la mañana El tipo mínimo para la tercera subasta será la mitad (1/2) del tipo mínimo que se pactara para la primera subasta, o sea, $107,640.00. Esta subasta se hará para satisfacer a la parte demandante, hasta donde alcance, el importe adeudado a BAUTISTA REO PR CORP. que al 15 de octubre de 2022 ascendía a una suma no menor de $155,128.73 la cual se compone de las siguientes partidas: (i) bajo el Pagaré A, $65,170.59 por concepto de principal; más $30,379.00 por concepto de intereses acumulados, los cuales continúa acumulándose diariamente en la cantidad de $11.31 hasta su total y completo pago; más $6,086.82 por concepto de cargos por mora, los cuales continúan acumulándose a la tasa de interés pactada hasta su total y completo pago; más $24,112.90 bajo el default rate aplicable hasta su total y completo pago, más $104.00 por concepto de otros gastos; y (ii) bajo el Pagaré B, $11,335.42 por concepto de intereses acu-

mulados y no pagados; más (iii) $17,940.00 por concepto de costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado según expresamente pactados. La venta en pública subasta de la propiedad descrita anteriormente se verificará libre de toda carga o gravamen posterior que afecte dicha propiedad. Se entiende que cualquier carga y/o gravamen anterior y/o preferente, si lo hubiera, al crédito que da base a esta ejecución, continuará subsistente, entendiéndose además, que el rematante los acepta y queda subrogado en la responsabilidad de los mismos, sin destinarse a su extinción el precio del remate. Que los autos y todos los documentos correspondientes al procedimiento incoado estarán de manifiesto en la Secretaría de este Tribunal durante horas laborables. El Alguacil procederá a otorgar la correspondiente escritura de venta judicial y se pondrá al comprador en posesión física del inmueble, de conformidad con las disposiciones de Ley.

POR LA PRESENTE, se les notifica a los titulares de créditos y/o cargas registrales posteriores, si alguno, que se celebrará la SUBASTA en la fecha, hora y sitio anteriormente señalados, y se les invita a que concurran a dicha subasta, si les conviniere, o se les invita a satisfacer, antes del remate, el importe del crédito, sus intereses, otros cargos y las costas y honorarios de abogado asegurados, quedando entonces subrogados en los derechos del Acreedor ejecutante, siempre y cuando reúnan los requisitos y cualificaciones de Ley para que se pueda efectuar tal subrogación. Y PARA SU PUBLICACIÓN en el tablón de edictos de este Tribunal y en tres (3) lugares públicos del Municipio donde se celebrará la subasta señalada. Además, en un periódico de circulación general en dos (2) ocasiones y mediante correo certificado a la última dirección conocida de la parte demandada. EXPEDIDO el presente EDICTO DE SUBASTA en Ponce, Puerto Rico, a 22 de febrero de 2024. Miguel A. Torres Ayala, ALGUACIL TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE PONCE.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA

SALA SUPERIOR DE CAGUAS

BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO

Demandante V. RAYMOND PIÑEIRO

SOTO T/C/C RAMÓN PIÑEIRO SOTO, LYDIA

ROMÁN CALERO Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

Demandados

CIVIL NÚM. CG2022CV03206

SOBRE: ACCION IN REM Y EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA

POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA. AVISO DE VENTA EN PÚBLICA

SUBASTA. Yo, Alejandro Urbina Roque, Alguacil Supervisor de la División de Subastas del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de Caguas, a los demandados 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 de epígrafe con fecha 5 de diciembre de 2023 y para satisfacer la cantidad adeudada de $143,435.30 de principal mediante Sentencia dictada en el caso de autos el 6 de octubre de 2023, notificada y archivada en autos el 17 de octubre de 2023, 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, mediante efectivo, giro o cheque certificado a nombre del Alguacil de este Tribunal todo derecho, título e interés que hayan tenido tengan o puedan tener los deudores demandados en cuanto a la propiedad localizada en el Municipio de Caguas, Puerto Rico, el bien inmueble se describe a continuación: RÚSTICA: Solar marcado con el número tres (3) en el plano de inscripción radicado en el barrio Río Cañas de Caguas, con un área de 2,559.703 metros cuadrados. En lindes al NORTE, y en varias alineaciones con una franja de Quebrada Arenas a dedicarse a uso público, 31.48 metros; al NORESTE, con Martín Nesky, mide 12.82 metros; al ESTE, con el solar marcado con el número cuatro (4), mide 73.71 metros, al SUR y en varias alineaciones con una franja a dedicarse a uso público para futuro ensanche de camino municipal mide 35.31 metros y al OESTE, con el solar marcado con el número dos (2), mide 73.03 metros. inscrita al folio 36 del tomo 1241 de Caguas, Finca número 43,628 Registro de la Propiedad de Caguas, Sección Primera. Con el importe de dicha venta se habrá de satisfacer a la parte demandante las cantidades adeudadas, en el caso de epígrafe, que se desglosan de la siguiente forma: $143,435.30 de principal, más 3.5% de intereses los cuales continúan acumulándose hasta el saldo total de la deuda; más $1,307.76 de gastos por mora, los cuales continúan acumulán-

dose 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 $153,681.00 para la propiedad antes descrita. De declarase la subasta desierta y tener que celebrarse una segunda subasta el tipo mínimo serán dos terceras partes (2/3) del precio mínimo antes mencionado: $102,454.00. Si tampoco hubiere remate ni adjudicación en la segunda subasta, regirá como tipo de la tercera subasta la mitad (1/2) del precio pactado; $76,840.50. La primera subasta se llevará a cabo el 2 de abril de 2024, a las 9:45 de la mañana de la mañana. De no comparecer postor alguno se llevará a efecto una segunda subasta el 9 de abril de 2024, a las 9:45 de la mañana. De no comparecer postor alguno se llevará a cabo una tercera subasta el 16 de abril de 2024, a las 9:45 de la mañana. La subasta o subastas antes indicadas se llevarán a efecto en mi oficina, localizada en el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de Caguas. Del Estudio de Título realizado surgen los siguientes gravámenes: GRAVAMENES: Por su procedencia: Servidumbre a favor de la Autoridad de las Fuentes Fluviales de Puerto Rico. Declarada esta finca como estorbo público por el Municipio de Caguas en virtud del Artículo 2.005, Inciso (C) de la Ley de Municipios Autónomos, para tomar anotación preventiva de los gatos incurridos y/o multas impuestas por haber sido así declarada la finca, la cual constituye un gravamen sobre la misma, según Resolución expedida por la Oficina de Permisos del Municipio Autónomo de Caguas, caso #EPP-2019-00066 del 4 de noviembre de 2019, anotado al tomo Karibe el 13 de junio de 2023, finca #43628 de Caguas anotación “A”. Se 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 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. 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. 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, durante horas laborables, en la Secretaría del Tribunal. Se entenderá que todo licitador acepta como bastante la titularidad y que las cargas y gravámenes anteriores y los preferentes, si los hubiere, al crédito del ejecutante, continuarán subsistentes; entendiéndose que el rematante los acepta y queda subrogado en la responsabilidad de los mismos, sin destinarse a su extinción el precio del remate. Y para conocimiento de los demandados, 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 la Sala de Caguas, Puerto Rico, a 15 de febrero de 2024. Alejandro Urbina Roque, Alguacil Auxiliar, Placa 997.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA

SALA SUPERIOR DE HUMACAO.

FIRSTBANK

PUERTO RICO

Parte Demandante VS. ALMANDA ÁVILA

RIVERA, POR SI Y COMO MIEMBRO DE LA SUCESIÓN DE JESÚS FONTANEZ

HUERTAS COMPUESTA

POR FULANO Y SUTANO DE TAL COMO

POSIBLES HEREDEROS

DESCONOCIDOS; CRIM

Parte Demandada

CIVIL NÚM. HU2022CV00918.

SALÓN NÚM. (206). SOBRE: EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA Y COBRO DE DINERO. EDICTO DE SUBASTA. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS

UNIDOS ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE P.R. SS.

A: ALMANDA ÁVILA

RIVERA, POR SI Y

COMO MIEMBRO DE LA SUCESIÓN DE JESÚS FONTANEZ HUERTAS COMPUESTA POR FULANO Y SUTANO DE TAL COMO POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS: CENTRO DE RECAUDACIONES DE INGRESOS

MUNICIPALES: DEPARTAMENTO DE HACIENDA: Y AL PUBLICO EN GENERAL:

El Alguacil que suscribe, certifica y hace constar que en cumplimiento de Mandamiento de Ejecución de Sentencia que me ha sido dirigido por la Secretaría del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala Superior de Humacao, procederé a vender en pública subasta y al mejor postor, por separado, de contado y por moneda de curso legal de los Estados Unidos de América. Todo pago recibido por el (la) Alguacil por concepto de subastas será en efectivo, giro postal o cheque certificado a nombre del (de la) Alguacil del Tribunal de Primera Instancia. Todo derecho, título, participación e interés que le corresponda a la parte demandada o cualquiera de ellos en el inmueble hipotecado objeto de ejecución que se describe a continuación: RUSTICA: Solar rotulado “B” en el Barrio Montones del término municipal de Las Piedras, Puerto Rico, con una cabida superficial de 621.87 metros cuadrados, y en lindes por el NORTE, en 19 metros con un camino municipal; por el SUR, en 19 metros con los terrenos propiedad de la Señora Margarita Torres; por el ESTE, en 33.65 metros con el solar rotulado “A” aprobado en este caso y con el remanente de la finca principal; y por el OESTE, en 3.81 metros con los terrenos propiedad del Señor Pedro Torres, hijo. Enclava sobre dicha finca una (1) estructura de hormigón y bloques dedicado a vivienda. Consta inscrita al folio 250 del tomo 167 de Las Piedras, finca número #8,775, Registro de la Propiedad de Puerto Rico, Sección de Humacao. La propiedad objeto de ejecución está localizada en la siguiente dirección: Sector La Romana, Lote B, KM 19.2, Carr. 183 Int., Las Piedras, P.R. 00771. Se informa que la propiedad a ser ejecutada se adquirirá libre de cargas y gravamen posterior, una vez sea otorgada la escritura de venta judicial y obtenida la Orden y Mandamiento de cancelación de gravamen posterior. (Art. 51, Ley 210-2015). En relación

The San Juan Daily Star

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 12 de marzo de 2024. En Carolina, Puerto Rico, el 12 de marzo de 2024.

KANELLY ZAYAS ROBLES, SECRETARIA. MARICRUZ

APONTE ALICEA, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR DEL TRIBUNAL.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA

CENTRO JUDICIAL DE CA-

GUAS SALA SUPERIOR DE CAGUAS LUNA RESIDENTIAL III, LLC

Demandante V. LUIS ÁNGEL ZAYAS

ALVERIO Y OTROS

Demandado(a)

Caso Núm.: CG2023CV02615.

Caso Núm.: (Salón 801). Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO - ORDINARIO Y OTROS. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA

POR EDICTO.

MARJALIISA COLÓN VILLANUEVA, MCOLON@WWCLAW.COM.

A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE COMO MIEMBROS

DESCONOCIDOS Y/O PERSONA CON INTERÉS

EN LA SUCESIÓN DE LUIS

ANGEL ZAYAS ALVERLO.

(Nombre de las partes que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto)

EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 04 de marzo de 2024, 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 12 de marzo de 2024. En Caguas, Puerto Rico, el 12 de marzo de 2024. LISILDA MARTÍNEZ AGOSTO, SECRETARIA. SANDRA TRINIDAD CAÑUELAS, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR DEL TRIBUNAL.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE SAN JUAN

BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO

Demandante V. SUCESIÓN DE NICOLÁS ENCARNACIÓN ULLOA

COMPUESTA POR EVA ENCARNACIÓN, FULANO

(A) DE TAL Y SUTANO

(A) DE TAL COMO POSIBLES HEREDEROS DESCONOCIDOS; SUCESIÓN DE ROSALINA

CEPEDA SEGURA T/C/C ROSELIA CEPEDA SEGURA COMPUESTA POR JULIO PAREDES

CEPEDA, JOSÉ

AGUSTÍN PAREDES

CEPEDA T/C/C MOISÉS PAREDES CEPEDA, ANA C. PAREDES CEPEDA, GERMANIA PAREDES

CEPEDA, ELSA C. PAREDES CEPEDA, ELCIDO C. PAREDES

CEPEDA, OSCAR

LORENZO DE JESÚS PAREDES CEPEDA, MOISÉS PAREDES

CEPEDA; CENTRO DE RECAUDACIÓN DE INGRESOS

MUNICIPALES; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA

Demandados

CIVIL NÚM. SJ2022CV05385

SOBRE: EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA. EDICTO DE SUBASTA. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA. EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU. EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO. SS. Yo, PEDRO HIEYE GONZÁLEZ, Alguacil del Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala de San Juan, al público HAGO SABER: Que en cumplimiento de un Mandamiento de Ejecución de Sentencia que se me libró con fecha de 2 de febrero de 2024, por la Secretaria de este Tribunal, en el caso de epígrafe, venderé en pública subasta y al mejor postor con dinero en efectivo, cheque de gerente y/o giro postal a nombre del Alguacil del Tribunal o letra bancaria con similar garantía, todo título, derecho o interés de la parte demandada de epígrafe sobre la siguiente propiedad perteneciente a la parte demandada, la cual se describe a continuación: “URBANA: Solar frente a la Calle Aurora del Barrio Santurce del término municipal de San Juan, Puerto Rico, con una cabida de noventa y siete metros veintinueve centímetros cuadrados y en lindes por su frente NORTE, con la calle Aurora en seis metros cuatrocientos noventa y cuatro milésimas de metro; por el SUR, en siete metros dos-

cientos setenta y tres milésimas de metros con Manuel Ríos; por el OESTE, en catorce metros ciento ochenta y tres milésimas de metros con Manuel Ríos; y por el ESTE, en catorce metros ciento cuatro milésimas de metro con terrenos de la finca principal de la cual se segrega éste. En este solar enclava una casa de una planta de concreto y techo de madera y zinc que lleva el número mil cincuenta de la Calle Aurora que tiene cinco metros veinte centímetros de frente a dicha calle; por el Este en doce metros noventa centímetros; por el Oeste en doce metros noventa centímetros; y por el Sur, en cinco metros veinte centímetros. Finca 5,214, inscrita al folio 163 del tomo 166 de Santurce Sur, Registro de la Propiedad de Puerto Rico, Sección I de San Juan. Dirección física: 1050 Calle Aurora, Barrio Santurce, San Juan, PR 00907. La finca 5,214 está gravada con la siguiente hipoteca cuya ejecución se solicita en la subasta objeto de este edicto: Hipoteca en garantía de un pagaré Popular Mortgage, lnc., o a su orden, por la suma principal de $110,000.00, con intereses al 7% anual, vencedero a la presentación, constituida mediante la escritura número 6, otorgada en San Juan, Puerto Rico el día 26 de marzo de 2008, ante la notario Jelka Lara Duchesne Sanabria, e inscrita al folio 52 del tomo 391 de Santurce Sur, finca número 5,214, inscripción 7ma. La propiedad está afecta a los siguientes gravámenes: A. Hipoteca en garantía de un pagaré a favor del Secretario de la Vivienda y Desarrollo Urbano, o a su orden, por la suma principal de $165,000.00, con intereses al 7% anual, vencedero a la presentación, constituida mediante la escritura número 7, otorgada en San Juan, Puerto Rico, el día 26 de marzo de 2008 ante la notario Jelka Lara Duchesne Sanabria, e inscrita al folio 52 del tomo 391 de Santurce Sur, finca número 5,214, inscripción 8va. B. Aviso de Demanda de fecha 17 de junio de 2022, expedido en el Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de San Juan, en el Caso Civil número SJ2022CV05385, sobre Cobro de Dinero y Ejecución de Hipoteca, seguido por el Banco Popular de Puerto Rico; versus Sucesión de Nicolas Encarnación Ulloa y su esposa Rosalia Cepeda Segura, compuestas por Eva Encarnación, Julio, José Agustín, Moisés,Ana, Germanía, Elsa, Elcido, Oscar Lorenzo de Jesús, todos apellidos Paredes Cepeda, Crim, Estados Unidos de América, Fulano y Sutano de Tal, como herederos desconocidos, por la suma de $213,913.26, más intereses y otras sumas adicionales anotado el día 27 de junio de 2022, al tomo Karibe de Santurce Sur, finca número 5,214, Anotación

“A”. La venta se llevará a cabo para con su producto satisfacer a Banco Popular de Puerto Rico por la hipoteca de $110,000.00 total o parcialmente. 1. La venta se llevará a cabo para con su producto satisfacer a Banco Popular de Puerto Rico, total o parcialmente el importe de la Sentencia emitida el 10 de julio de 2023, notificada y archivada en autos el 13 de julio de 2023. El importe de la Sentencia dictada en el caso de epígrafe, ascendente a las siguientes cantidades: $213,913.26 al 31 de marzo 2022. Los intereses continúan acumulándose hasta el pago total de la obligación. Los cargos por servicio y las primas de seguro continúan acumulándose hasta el pago total de la obligación. Los cargos por servicio y las primas de seguro continúan acumulándose hasta el pago total de la obligación. Además, la parte demandada adeuda los créditos accesorios y adelantos hecho en virtud de la escritura de hipoteca; y los costos, gastos y honorarios de abogado equivalentes a $11,000.00; así como cualquier otra suma que se haga en virtud de la escritura de hipoteca. El precio mínimo de licitación con relación a la antes descrita propiedad y la fecha y hora de cada subasta es como sigue:

PRIMERA SUBASTA: Se celebrará el día 8 de abril de 2024 a las 10:00 de la mañana Precio mínimo: $110,000.00 SEGUN-

DA SUBASTA: Se celebrará el día 15 de abril de 2024 a las 10:00 de la mañana Precio Mínimo: $73,333.33 TERCERA

SUBASTA: Se celebrará el día 22 de abril de 2024 a las 10:00 de la mañana Precio Mínimo: $55,000.00. Las subastas de dicha propiedad se llevarán a efecto en mi oficina situada en el local que ocupa este Tribunal en el Centro Judicial de San Juan, advirtiéndose que el que obtuviere la buena pro de dicha propiedad consignará en el acto del remate el importe de su oferta en moneda legal, en adición a los gastos de la subasta, siendo éste el mejor postor. En cualquier momento luego de haberse comenzado el acto de la subasta, el Alguacil podrá requerir de los licitadores que le evidencien la capacidad de pago de sus posturas. Se entenderá que todo licitador acepta como bastante el título del inmueble y las cargas o gravámenes anteriores y los preferentes al crédito del ejecutante, si los hubiere, continuarán subsistiendo, entendiéndose que el rematante los acepta y queda responsable de los mismos sin destinarse a su extinción el precio del remate. Se le apercibe a los tenedores de gravámenes posteriores al que se ejecuta que, para proteger cualesquiera derechos que tengan sobre el inmueble, deberán comparecer a la subasta, pues de no

hacerlo así y de no igualar el precio de venta del gravamen hipotecario que se ejecuta, el Tribunal ordenará la cancelación de todos los gravámenes posteriores. La propiedad a ser ejecutada se adquiere libre de cargas y gravámenes posteriores. Si se declara desierta la tercera subasta se adjudicará la finca a favor del acreedor por la totalidad de la cantidad adeudada si ésta es igual o menor que el monto del tipo mínimo de la tercera subasta, si el Tribunal lo estima conveniente. Se abonará dicho monto a la cantidad adeudada si ésta es mayor. Los autos y todos los documentos correspondientes al procedimiento del caso de epígrafe están disponibles en la Secretaría del Tribunal Superior de Puerto Rico, Sala Superior de San Juan, durante horas laborables. Para conocimiento de la parte demandada y de toda persona que tenga interés inscrito con posterioridad a la inscripción del gravamen que se está ejecutando, si alguna, y para la concurrencia de licitadores y para el público en general el presente edicto se publicará en un diario de circulación general en el Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico una vez por semana por un término de dos (2) semanas con un intervalo de por lo menos siete (7) días entre cada publicación. Se fijará además, en tres (3) lugares públicos del Municipio donde ha de celebrarse la subasta, estos lugares serán la Alcaldía, el Tribunal y la Colecturía de dicho Municipio. Se notificará a la parte demandada copia del edicto de subasta mediante correo certificado con acuse de recibo a su dirección que obra en autos. Una vez efectuada la correspondiente venta judicial, otorgaré la escritura del traspaso al licitador victorioso, quien podrá ser la parte demandante, cuya oferta podrá aplicarse a la extinción parcial o total de la obligación reconocida por la Sentencia. Colocaré al licitador victorioso en posesión física de la Propiedad mediante el lanzamiento de los ocupantes en el término legal de veinte (20) días desde la fecha de la venta en pública subasta. Si transcurren los referidos veinte (20) días, el Tribunal podrá ordenar, sin necesidad de ulterior procedimiento, que se lleve a efecto el desalojo o lanzamiento del ocupante o ocupantes de la finca o de todos los que por orden o tolerancia del deudor la ocupen. El Registrador de la Propiedad cancelará, libre de derechos, todo gravamen posterior a la fecha en que se otorgó la hipoteca que ha sido ejecutada mediante esta acción, y procederá a la inscripción de la venta a favor del comprador en subasta libre de todo gravamen posterior a la fecha en que se otorgó la hipoteca que ha sido ejecutada mediante esta ac-

ción. Expido el presente edicto bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal de Primera Instancia, Sala de San Juan. En San Juan, Puerto Rico, a 28 de febrero de 2024.

PEDRO HIEYE GONZÁLEZ, ALGUACIL TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE SAN JUAN.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE HATILLO

RAFAEL RIVERA SEIN, AMPARO RIVERA SEIN, LUIS FRANCISCO RIVERA

SEIN, ISABEL RIVERA

SEIN, GREGORIO RIVERA

SEIN, CARMEN MARIA

RIVERA ESPINOSA, REINALDO RIVERA, JR., GLADYS RIVERA, Y ADRIAN RIVERA RIVERA

Demandante Vs. ÁNGELA PIÑEIRO CRUZ

Y ZULMA IVELISSE

RIVERA ESPINOSA

Demandada

CIVIL NÚM. AR2024CV00212

SALA NÚM. 101 SOBRE: LIQUIDACIÓN DE COMUNIDAD DE BIENES HEREDITARIOS. INTERPELACIÓN. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO.

ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA. EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU. EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO. SS.

A: ZULMA LVELISSE

RIVERA ESPINOSA •

103 BANCROFT STREET SPRINGFIELD MA 01107.

POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al tribunal su alegación responsiva dentro de los treinta (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. LCDO. LUIS SEVILLANO SÁNCHEZ PO BOX 141118, ARECIBO, PUERTO RICO 00614-1118 TEL.878-5132 / FAX: 880-3073 ofic.lcdo.luissevillano@gmail.com EXPENDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y sello del Tribunal, hoy 26 de febrero de 2024. Vivian Y. Fresse González, Secretaria Regional. Brenda Torres Muñiz, Secretaria Auxiliar.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SUPERIOR DE MAYAGÜEZ.

LUIS D. SANTIAGO RODRIGUEZ Y YAMILET MARRERO

EXPARTE

Civil Núm.: MZ2023CV00965. Sobre: EXPEDIENTE DE DOMINIO. EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO. SS.

A: PERSONA COLINDANTE, DUEÑOS ANTERIORES, HEREDEROS, CAUSAHABIENTES, PERSONA DESCONOCIDA O PERSONA IGNORADA Y CUALQUIER OTRA

PERSONA NATURAL O JURÍDICA CON INTERÉS QUE CREA TENER ALGÚN DERECHO REAL SOBRE ESTA PROPIEDAD O QUE CREA SER PERJUDICADA CON LA INSCRIPCIÓN SOLICITADA

Por la presente se notifica que Don Luis D. Santiago Rodríguez y Doña Yamilet Marrero han presentado una Petición ante este Honorable Tribunal para que se declare a su favor el dominio del siguiente inmueble: RUSTICA: Parcela de terreno marcada con el número uno (1) en el Plano de Inscripción radicada en el Barrio Guamá del término municipal de San Germán, con una cabida superficial de MIL CUATROCIENTOS NOVENTA Y CINCO PUNTO NUEVE MIL NOVECIENTOS NOVENTA Y CINCO METROS CUADRADOS (1,495.9997 MC). En lindes por el NORTE, con un área dedicada a uso público y solar número cuatro (4); por el SUR, con solar dedicado a uso público, y solar número cinco (5) y franja verde que lo separa de una quebrada; por el ESTE, con solar número tres (3) en el Plano de Inscripción y por el OESTE, un área dedicada a uso público y solar número cinco (5) y franja verde que separa de una quebrada. Dicho solar fue segregado de la finca 5,442, Folio 75, Tomo 163 de San German. --No consta estructura edificada en el solar. ---Catastro numero 310-099-294-01-000. La Abogada de la parte Peticionaria es la siguiente:

LCDA. CAREN A. RUIZ PEREZ RUA 19,900

#160 Ave. Universidad Interamericana

TEL. (787) 264-4444 ruizcaren@yahoo.com Y se le notifica a usted, que este Tribunal ha ordenado se le cite para que de verse perjudicado por la inscripción que se solicita pueda oponerse oportunamente a este expediente de dominio; advirtiéndole que de no presentar oposición dentro del término de veinte (20) días a contar desde la publicación de este edicto, los promoventes podrán obtener que se apruebe esta solicitud de Expediente de Dominio y se mande a inscribir a su nombre, en el Registro de la Propiedad de Puerto Rico, Sección de San Germán, el dominio del predio de terreno anteriormente descrito. De no tener representación legal, puede acceder a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https:// unircd.ramaiudicíal.pr. Este Tribunal ordenó que se publique la pretensión por tres (3) veces durante el término de veinte (20) días en un periódico de circulación general diaria, para que los que tengan algún derecho real sobre el inmueble descrito, las personas ignoradas a quienes pueda perjudicar la inscripción, y en general, a todos los que desearen oponerse, puedan efectuarlo dentro del término de veinte (20) días a partir de la última publicación del presente escrito. Por tanto, libro la presente en Mayagüez, Puerto Rico hoy día 14 de marzo de 2024, bajo mi firma y sello oficial. Lic. Norma G. Santana Irizarry, Secretaria Regional. Alexandra Mane López, Secretaría Servicios a Sala.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA

SALA DE CAGUAS FINANCE OF AMERICA

REVERSE LLC

Demandante Vs. EVELYN GONZÁLEZ

IRIZARRY T/C/C

EVELYN GONZÁLEZ

T/C/C EVELYN CASTRO

POR SÍ; SUCESIÓN DE NATALIO CASTRO

CRUZ T/C/C NATALIO

CASTRO COMPUESTA

POR NORMA CASTRO, PABLO CRUZ, EVELYN GONZÁLEZ IRIZARRY

T/C/C EVELYN

GONZÁLEZ T/C/C

EVELYN CASTRO, FULANO DE TAL

Y SUTANO DE TAL

COMO HEREDEROS DE NOMBRES DESCONOCIDOS; CENTRO DE RECAUDACIÓN DE INGRESOS

to cover the sums adjudged to be paid to the plaintiff, the following property: URBANA: Solar identificado con el número “C” raya cuatro (C-4) en el plano de inscripción del barrio Las Cabezas de Fajardo, Puerto Rico, con una cabida de Cuatrocientos treinta punto mil ochocientos siete metros cuadrados (430.1807). En lindes por el NORTE, con el solar número “C” raya tres (C-3); por el SUR, con un camino público; por el ESTE, con carretera Insular número novecientos ochenta y siete (987); y por el OESTE, con el solar “S” raya dos (S-2). Enclava una casa de concreto armado y bloques de dos (2) plantas, dos (2) baños y balcón por su lateral derecho y frente. La primera planta consta de cuatro (4) apartamentos individualizados, con respectivos cuartos de baño, marquesina y un “laundry room” en el lado posterior. Finca 11864, inscrita al folio 136 del tomo 414 de Fajardo, inscripción 7ma, Registro de la Propiedad Sección de Fajardo. Physical address: 987 SR k.m. 4.2 Lot C4, Cabezas WD, Fajardo, P.R. 00738 WHEREAS, the property is subject to the following junior liens and/or attachments: LIS PENDENS issued in the Court of First Instance, Fajardo Section, under civil case number NSCI201100393 regarding collection of monies and foreclosure of mortgage filed by REO Properties Corp. vs. Cecilio Matta Marquez and Norma Iris Figueroa Aguilar and the conjugal partnership constituted therein, in reference to the mortgage recorded under the 7th inscription for the principal amount of $123,101.17 plus interest and other expenses, recorded on August 30, 2011 at entry 136 of volume 414 of Fajardo, property 14,864, Annotation A. Potential bidders are advised to verify the extent of preferential liens with holders thereof. It is understood that potential bidders acquire the property subject to any and all senior liens, including any existing statutory liens, which may encumber the property. It shall be understood that each bidder accepts as sufficient the title that prior and preferential liens to the one being foreclosed upon, including but not limited to any property tax liens (express, tacit, implied or legal) shall continue in effect it being understood further that the successful bidder accepts them and is subrogated in the responsibility for the same and the bid price shall not be applied toward cancellation of senior liens. The property will be acquired free and clear of all junior liens and encumbrances. THEREFORE, the first public sale shall be held on the 26th day of April 2024 at 10:30 AM and the minimum bid that will be accepted is the sum of $124,000.00. In the event said

first public auction does not produce a bidder and the property is not adjudicated, a second public auction shall be held on the 3rd day of May 2024 at 10:30 AM and the minimum bid that will be accepted is the sum of $82,666.67, 2/3 parts of the minimum bid for the 1st public sale. If said second auction does not result in the adjudication and sale of the property, a third auction will be held on the 10th day of May 2024, at 10:30 AM and the minimum bid that will be accepted is the sum of $62,000.00, ½ of the minimum bid for the 1st public sale. Upon confirmation of the sale, an order shall be issued canceling all junior liens. For further particulars, reference is made to the judgment entered by the Court in this case, which can be examined in the Office of the Clerk of the United States District Court during regular business hour and/or by accessing by internet the electronic court record system (PACER) at https://ecf.prd.uscourts.gov. In San Juan, Puerto Rico, this 7th of March of 2024. Aguedo de la Torre, Special Master.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA CENTRO JUDICIAL DE AIBONITO SALA SUPERIOR DE COMERÍO

BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO

Demandante V. CARLOS JESÚS RIVERA RIVERA Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA CON MÓNICA RODRÍGUEZ

ALICEA T/C/C MÓNICA ALICEA Y OTROS

Demandado(a)

Caso Núm.: CR2023CV00409. (Salón: 001). Sobre: EJECUCIÓN DE HIPOTECA: PROPIEDAD RESIDENCIAL. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

BELMA ALONSO GARCÍA, OFICINABELMAALONSO@GMAIL. COM.

MARINILDA RIVERA VARGAS, MRIVERAVARGAS@YAHOO.COM.

A: MÓNICA RODRÍGUEZ

ALICEA T/C/C

MÓNICA ALICEA Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA CON CARLOS JESUS

RIVERA RIVERA A SUS

ÚLTIMAS DIRECCIONES

CONOCIDAS: PR 749

KM 4.1 INT. QUEBRADA GRANDE WARD, BARRANQUITAS PR 00794, COND. ALTOS DE MIRAFLORES, 969 AVE. HIGUILLAR, APT. 121,

DORADO, PR 00646-8203, CARR. 823, SECTOR CUCHILLAS, BO. RÍO LAJAS, TOA ALTA, PR 00953, HC 1 BOX 3972, BARRANQUITAS, PR 00794-9665, PO BOX 959, BARRANQUITAS PR 00794-0959 Y PO BOX 1672, CIDRA PR 007391672.

(Nombre de las partes que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 11 de marzo de 2024, 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 11 de marzo de 2024. En Comerío, Puerto Rico, el 11 de marzo de 2024. ELIZABETH GONZÁLEZ RIVERA, SECRETARIA. CARMEN APONTE FLORES, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR DEL TRIBUNAL.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE BAYAMÓN ISLAND PORTFOLIO SERVICES, LLC, COMO AGENTE DE FAIRWAY ACQUISITIONS FUND, LLC.

Demandante Vs. AIMEE SERRANO GONZALEZ

Demandado

Civil Núm.: BY2023CV04497.

Salón: 504. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS.

A: AIMEE SERRANO

GONZALEZ - URB ALT DE FLAMBOYAN QQ6 CALLE 30A, BAYAMÓN, P.R. 00959; 19020 NW 57TH AVE., HIALEAH, FL 33015.

POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza por la deuda recla-

mada de $5,127.72 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 dirección electrónica: https://www.poderjudicial.pr/ index.php/tribunal-electronico/ 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, Lcdo.

Edwin Serrano Peña cuyas direcciones son: P.O. Box 71418 San Juan, Puerto Rico 009368518, teléfono (787) 993-3731 a la dirección edwin.serrano@ orf-law.com y a la dirección notificaciones@orf-law.com. EX-

TENDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en Bayamón, Puerto Rico, hoy día 22 de enero de 2024. En Bayamón, Puerto Rico, el 22 de enero de 2024. LCDA. LAURA I. SANTA SÁNCHEZ, SECRETARIA. VIVIAN J. SANABRIA, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE BAYAMÓN ISLAND PORTFOLIO SERVICES, LLC COMO AGENTE DE FAIRWAY ACQUISITIONS FUND, LLC

Parte Demandante Vs. ANUBIS K APONTE RAMIREZ

Parte Demandada

Civil Núm.: BY2023CV04420. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS. A: ANUBIS K APONTE RAMIREZURB HERMANAS DAVILA 241 CALLE MUNOZ

RIVERA, BAYAMON PR 00959-5162.

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. La parte demandante alega que la parte demandada le adeuda la cantidad de DOS

MIL DOSCIENTOS SETEN-

TA Y NUEVE DÓLARES CON OCHENTA Y UN CENTAVOS ($2,279.81). 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 dirección electrónica: https:/// www.poderjudicial.pr/index. php/tribunal-electronico, 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 al abogado de la parte demandante, Edwin Serrano Peña cuya dirección es: P.O. Box 71418 San Juan, Puerto Rico 00936-8518, teléfono (787) 993-3731 a la dirección edwin. serrano@orf-law.com y a la dirección notificaciones@orf-law. com. EXTENDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en BAYAMON, Puerto Rico, hoy día 22 de enero de 2024.

LCDA. LAURA I. SANTA SÁNCHEZ, SECRETARIA. VIVIAN J. SANABRIA, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE PONCE ISLAND PORTFOLIO SERVICES, LLC COMO AGENTE DE FAIRWAY ACQUISITIONS FUND, LLC

Parte Demandante Vs. CARLOS J COLON COLON, FULANA DE TAL & LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES

COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

Parte Demandada Civil Núm.: PO2023CV03435. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS, EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO, SS. A: CARLOS J COLON COLON BO CARACOLES 5185 CALLE OSTRA, PONCE PR 00717-1452; PO BOX 963, JUANA DIAZ, PR 00795; 76 BLACK OAK DR, LANCASTER PA 17602.

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 dirección electrónica: https:///www. poderjudicial.pr/index.php/tribunal-electronico, 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 al abogado de la parte demandante, Kenmuel J. Ruiz Lopez cuya dirección es: P.O. Box 71418 San Juan, Puerto Rico 00936-8518, teléfono (787) 993-3731 a la dirección kenmuel.ruiz@orf-law. com y a la dirección notificaciones@orf-law.com. EXTENDIDO BAJO MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, en PONCE, Puerto Rico, hoy día 9 de enero de 2024. CARMEN TIRÚ QUIÑONES, SECRETARIA. KEILENE RODRÍGUEZ MELÉNDEZ, SECRETARIA AUXILIAR.

LEGAL NOTICE

ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA

CENTRO JUDICIAL DE FAJARDO SALA SUPERIOR

LIME HOMES, LTD

Parte Demandante Vs. JOSE ENRIQUE

MAYORAL AMY, TAMBIÉN

CONOCIDO COMO JOSE MAYORAL AMY, LISA MARIE PENFIELD KIRBY TAMBIÉN

CONOCIDA COMO LISA PENFIELD KIRBY Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES

COMPUESTA POR AMBOS; ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA

POR CONDUCTO DEL FISCAL FEDERAL DE LA CORTE DE DISTRITO DE ESTADOS UNIDOS PARA

EL DISTRITO DE PUERTO RICO

Parte Demandada

Caso Civil Núm.: FA2019CV00915. 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 Fajardo, Oficina de Subasta; 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 $146,116.19 de balance de principal, más los intereses sobre dicha suma al 6.25% anual, desde el día primero de marzo de 2012 hasta su completo pago, más las primas de seguro hipotecario y riesgo, recargos por demora computados al 5% sobre cada mensualidad de principal e interés, más la suma de $12,000.00 como cantidad estipulada para honorarios de abogado, pactada en la escritura de hipoteca; y cuales quiera otras sumas que por cualesquiera concepto legal se devenguen hasta el día de la subasta. La propiedad a venderse en pública subasta se describe como sigue: RUSTICA: Solar Bloque E número siete (7) de la comunidad de La Romana del Barrio Flamenco del término municipal de Culebra, con una cabida de setecientos sesenta y uno punto quinientos sesenta y ocho (761.568) metros cuadrados, por le Norte, con Calle número siete (7) y Parcela número seis (6); por el Sur, con Parcela número trece y ocho (13 y 8); por el Este, con Calle número siete (7); y por el Oeste, con Parcelas número seis, catorce y trece (6,14 y 13). Inscrita al folio cincuenta y cinco (55) del tomo veintiocho (28) de Culebra, finca número mil doscientos noventa y seis (1296). Registro de la Propiedad de Fajardo. Dirección física: Lot 7 Block E, Comm La Romana, Culebra, PR 00775. La PRIMERA SUBASTA se llevará a cabo el día 10 DE ABRIL DE 2024 A LAS 9:30 DE LA MAÑANA y servirá de tipo mínimo para la misma la suma de $120,000.00 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 17 DE ABRIL DE 2024 A LAS 9:30 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 $80,000.00. Si tampoco hubiera remate ni adjudicación en la segunda subasta, se celebrará una TERCERA

SUBASTA el día 24 DE ABRIL DE 2024 A LAS 9:30 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 $60,000.00. 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. 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 responsabilidad 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. 210-2015). Expedido el presente en Fajardo, Puerto Rico a 15 de marzo de 2024. JORGE A. ORTIZ ESTRADA, ALGUACIL REGIONAL INTERINO, ALGUACIL DEL TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA, SALA DE FAJARDO.

How to Play:

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

Crossword

Annexes

Assorted

Awfully Bides

Blimp Brains Buried Caved Covert

Dessert

Evolves

False

Fanciful Farther Ferry Fines Folks Forebode Fries Garbs Gender Groves Guppy Hikes

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Shady Shaping Spore Tales

Double A veteran Omar Hernández reaches 700 hits: ‘I set that goal and never gave up’

Omar Hernández had the goal of reaching 700 hits and he achieved it this past Sunday, becoming the 15th player to reach the historic figure in Puerto Rico’s Double A Superior Baseball League.

Hernández has the most hits among the league’s active players, and for 31 seasons he has suited up for the same team, the Samaritans of San Lorenzo.

“It makes me proud, after so much effort and sacrifice that one makes, because this is what one loves,” the 49-year-old said. “I set that goal for myself and I never, ever gave up. I demanded a lot from my body, from my age, from my ability as a player, but

here we are.”

No. 700, a base hit to right field, near the line, came in the fourth inning against the Jueyeros de Maunabo’s Héctor Torres. Hernández did it on his second attempt of the afternoon, after grounding out to second base in his first at-bat.

“The San Lorenzo fans and my family, everyone is very happy,” he said. “I have received many congratulations. I think that the love they have for me is the love that I also have for them.”

Regarding the possibility of retirement, he said that it is something that he has in mind to formalize in 2025.

“I am already thinking about retiring

next year. I want to retire maybe in all phases,” he said. “I want to do something with people, something nice. If God allows it, it will be next year.”

Upon notching his 700th hit, Hernández was greeted by the Samaritans and Jueyeros players. In addition, he received a commemorative plaque from the Puerto Rico Baseball Federation, presented by the president, Dr. José Daniel Quiles, and the executive director, Efraín Williams. Likewise, he was accompanied by Maunabo coach José Ponce, a member of the 900 hits club, along with team representatives Jozem Reyes (San Lorenzo) and Efraín Crespo (Maunabo).

Fernando Morales will lead the Korean women’s national volleyball team

By THE STAR STAFF

Now-former Puerto Rico National Team coach Fernando Morales became the new coach of the Korea senior women’s national team earlier this week.

In the coming weeks, Morales will head to Korea to begin a new chapter in his career as a volleyball coach. Starting April 15, he will lead the Korean squad that he has coached against, and he will do so with his assistant, Jesús Echevarría.

“When I received the offer, many things went through my mind, such as leaving the Puerto Rico National Team, where I have been for so long as a player and as a coach; but obviously it was a great opportunity as a coach that will open many doors for me in my career,” said Morales, 42, in a written statement.

“I consulted with people I trust, with former players and with other coaches, and 99 percent told me that it was a great step for my career and you should do it,” he added.

Morales had been the leader of the senior women’s national team since October 2020, and head coach of the women’s volleyball team at the University of Evansville in Indiana since 2019.

“The decision was difficult for me for two reasons: one, and the most difficult, was to leave Puerto Rico; and two, one is stable here in the United States and everything is go -

ing well at the university,” Morales said. “But when I started coaching I always wanted to do it in other leagues and other teams, and I couldn’t let this opportunity pass me by.”

Korea is 40th in the women’s volleyball world rankings, while Puerto Rico is 16th.

“Korea has not won in the VNL [FIVB Women’s Nations League] for two years, they did not win a match in the Pre-Olympic [tournament], and they did not qualify for the Olympics because they dropped a lot in the ranking and that is why they decided to make the change [in the coaching staff],” Morales said. “Practices start on April 15, but they want me there before that to watch the league games. The only thing there this year is the VNL, and then we will have a camp to continue training the team.”

Morales said he will have translators to communicate with his players.

“I don’t know the English level of the players, but it will be one of the many new things I will encounter when I arrive in Korea,” he said.

“[Puerto Rican Volleyball Federation President César] Trabanco supported me 100 percent,” Morales stressed. “I am very grateful to Trabanco, first, because if it were not for him giving me the confidence to lead the Puerto Rico National Team, this opportunity would not be presented to me; and second, he made the decision easier for me by having his support.”

“I thought about it about 10 times before calling him [Trabanco], because one gets scared because one doesn’t know how he will react, but since I mentioned it to him he has supported me,” said the former setter of the men’s national team. “And thanks to those [years] I did with the National Team, I am given this opportunity because in the interview they mentioned it to me, that they were very impressed with the results we obtained in the Pre-Olympic and that is why they offered me the position.”

The federation president said “Opportunities like this appear only once in a lifetime, and I applaud and fully support Fernando in his decision.”

“I don’t cut off anyone’s future,” Trabanco added. “In 35 years of training doctors, I have always been in favor of human growth. I wish you the best of success in this new opportunity, and to Jesús [Echevarría] too.”

Among Morales’ top achievements at the helm of the senior women’s team, he highlighted “the silver medal in the NORCECA Championship in 2021, which was my first tournament; silver in the Central American and Caribbean Games (San Salvador 2023) and silver in the Pan American Cup (Ponce 2023).”

“Passing the second round at the 2022 World Championships [in the Netherlands and Poland] was another great achievement, and the victories in last year’s Olympic Quali-

fiers where we beat Belgium for the first time in history. We also beat Bulgaria and Argentina,” Morales said. “These were the best tournaments we have had in history.”

Trabanco noted that “[o]n Friday we will announce the new coaching staff for the Women’s National Team, which has tiny, but real, options to qualify for the Paris 2024 Olympics.”

Fernando Morales had led the senior women’s national volleyball team since October 2020, and had been the head coach of the women’s volleyball team at the University of Evansville in Indiana since 2019. (Photo courtesy of FIVB)

The San Juan Daily Star

Omar Hernández celebrates hit number 700. (Photo by Brian Díaz)