A reader reports that judicial officials have at least three complaints against Michael Forrest and Principal Financial, a high-interest operation.

A Canadian investor said Wednesday that he was the third to file a complaint. He came from Canada to file the paperwork.

According to investors, the firm went missing in March from its offices in the Centro Colón.

The most visible representative of the firm here was a Canadian named Michael Forrest. One investor said that Principal changed its name to Montefiore shortly before closing its doors.

The firm is believed operated by Jerry LaTulippe, a 59-year-old Palm Beach, Fla., resident. Principal Financial also maintained an office in the Torre Las Mercedes further east on Paseo Colón.

The firm promised a return of 4 percent per month, one investor said.

Forrest, who has a home here, contacted A.M. Costa Rica about a month ago and said that he was in Florida working with LaTulippe to generate money to pay investors. The firm is believed to have less than 150 investors, and the amount of money they gave Forrest and his associates is not known.

The company joins a long list of other high-interest firms that have run into financial difficulties in the last year. The most visible was The Brothers, operated by Luis Enrique and Oswaldo Villalobos Camacho. They closed their doors last Oct 21 with some $1 billion in investor money on their books. Enrique is a fugitive, and Oswaldo is in Cinica Catolica under judicial order.

Savings Unlimited, operated by Louis Milianes, closed its doors the weekend of Nov. 22. Milanes is a fugitive, too. The loss to investors here is about $240 million.

The Vault, another high-profile, high-interest firm closed up as a result of a police raid downtown June 24. At the same time the principal, Roy Taylor, shot himself fatally while he was being held in police custody.

The Green Fund, another high-interest operation, has defaulted on payments to investors but operator Tom Jafek said he has not given up trying to generate the money to pay his debts.

Another once-high flying financier, Marc Harris, is in custody in Miami. He left Panamá for Nicaragua where he was arrested June 10 in Managua and immediately taken to the United States for trial.

Harris, a defrocked Florida accountant, faces a multitude of charges, including money laundering. He was a frequent visitor to Costa Rica and charged up to $500 apiece for tickets to financial seminars. He was involved in helping U.S. firms avoid taxes by reinvoicing their products with offshore corporations.

Arthur VanDesande is the criminal investigator for the U.S. Internal Revenue Service responsible for overall case management in the Harris matter. He is at the Miami, Fla., field office. He said he is seeking the names and contact information of victims and clients of Harris’ corporations. His phone number is (305) 982-5235.

The Internal Revenue Service is the U.S. tax collector. Officials believe that much of what Harris did to save taxes for U.S. firms will not stand up to official scrutiny.

Robbers were outnumbered by police Wednesday night at a grocery in Sabana Sur. 

Three heavily armed men held up the AM/PM store on the Old Escazú Road in Sabana Sur and stripped shoppers of their valuables. The trio fired guns that attracted the attention of persons outside the store. They called police.

Fuerza Pública officers, who have their headquarters only a few blocks away, surrounded the store even as the robbery was in progress. Officers shot one robber. A second fell into police hands, and a third was captured as he tried to run away.

A woman shopper suffered a bullet wound to the arm.  She left the scene in an ambulance.

The supermarket is just south of Parque La Sabana.

Brazilian pension plan
sparks public protests

BRASILIA, Brazil — Brazilian lawmakers have passed a controversial pension reform bill, triggering violent protests by tens of thousands of public sector workers. 

Rock-throwing demonstrators clashed with riot police in front of Congress Wednesday after the Chamber of Deputies approved the unpopular measure by a wide margin. 

Brazilian media reports said at least four protesters and two police officers were injured as rocks shattered windows inside Congress. Some demonstrators carried an effigy of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and put it in a coffin.  Others called the leftist president a traitor for pushing the measure through Congress. The overhaul is designed to cut benefits, raise the retirement age of public workers and tax their pensions. 

President da Silva's administration said the reform is crucial to save South America's largest country billions of dollars.  Some members of the president's Workers Party have been quoted as saying the overhaul is aimed at satisfying giant corporations, banks and the International Monetary Fund. 

The president took office in January pledging to honor Brazil's financial commitments, keep inflation low and maintain fiscal stability. He said his administration will work with the IMF to stabilize Brazil's finances. 

Chavez reported
replacing oil chief

CARACAS, Venezuela — Government sources in Venezuela say President Hugo Chavez is going to replace the head of the state oil company with one of his closest allies. 

The sources, who asked not to be named, said Wednesday that Chavez will replace current Petroleos de Venezuela President Ali Rodriguez with Diosdado Cabello as early as Sunday. 

Cabello is currently the country's infrastructure minister and has served as vice president and interior minister as well. He is one of Chavez's most trusted political friends. 

The Venezuelan government is restructuring the oil company after thousands of employees staged a strike in December and January. The strike, meant to force President Chavez out of office, crippled the country's economy. 
 

I told my friend that I had been  married  38 years as of today. . .  . . . and all she  could say was: 'Poor Sharon!' Happy Anniversary!

 

A new study shows that air pollution from the September 11, 2001 collapse of New York City's World Trade Center had an impact on pregnant women and their unborn babies. 

According to the study, a number of pregnant women who were exposed to smoke and dust from the smoldering wreckage of the World Trade Center attacks had smaller babies than other women who were not nearby.

Dr. Gertrud Berkowitz is the author of the study and a lead researcher at New York's Mount Sinai School for Medicine. For the past two years, she has been investigating the short- and long-term effects the attacks had on pregnant women. 

"These women were more likely to have a baby who was small for gestational age — that means small for the length of the pregnancy in comparison to a control group who were not present in lower Manhattan at that time," she explained. "There could be some long-term effects, 

Initially, U.S. government and New York City health officials said there was no reason to worry about the air quality in the days immediately following the attacks around Ground Zero. However, there are a number of long-term studies underway to monitor the health of those who were exposed to the dust and smoke at the site.

Dr. Berkowitz believes that air pollution was the most likely cause of differences in babies' weights.

"There was some underestimate of what the levels of air pollution actually were like, particularly in the first couple of days," she said.

The new study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association followed 182 mothers who were in or near the wreckage while they were pregnant. About 15 of those women who were exposed to toxins found in debris during and after the attacks had babies whose birth weights were less than they should have been. 

In  order to be a policeman in Costa Rica, a candidate has to have passed what amounted to the first half of high school here that is called novento año.

Investigators began looking into the paperwork of some 213 policemen when it appeared that officers from San José and Cartago had attended and passed that grade level at a night school in Limón.

They began investigating harder when the records of the school showed that only about 30 students enrolled in the school, Liceo Nocturno de Limón, in the last two years.

Officials at the school made it easy because they had a file with photocopies of all 213 cédulas or identifications from the policemen in the same 
folder. It appears that none of them actually attended classes and simply paid between 20,000 

Officials are flabbergasted because falsifying an official document is a crime.  All the policemen involved got good grades, between 80 and 100, according to the records.

There is no secret that in certain schools under certain circumstances students can buy good grades. What is unusual about this case is the number of police who were involved.

The Minsterio de Gobernación, Policía y Seguridad Pública is facing the prospect of discharging some 213 policemen at a time when there is a push to crack down on crime.

Even more upsetting is the fact that one of the persons involved, Xinia Gamboa, is the sister of a national deputy, Carmen Gamboa, said officials.

The director of the school is Cira Díaz, officials said.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The United States expressed disappointment Wednesday over Iceland's decision to resume whaling for what Icelandic authorities say will be for scientific purposes. The State Department says the move will likely trigger a review of possible U.S. trade sanctions against Iceland. 

In response to complaints from conservation groups and others, Iceland greatly reduced the scope of its whaling program from what it had initially contemplated earlier this year. 

But Wednesday's announcement that Iceland would harvest more than 30 Minke whales for scientific research in the next two months none-the-less drew an expression of extreme disappointment from the United States, and a warning of possible U.S. sanctions. 

At a briefing here, State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said the United States had urged Iceland in numerous venues in recent months to refrain from starting the program. 

Reeker said that while whaling for nominal scientific purposes is allowed under the International Whaling Convention, the killing of whales is not necessary for research, and he raised the prospect of sanctions under a provision of a 1967 U.S. law, the Fisherman's Protective Act. 

"While Iceland's program is technically legal under the whaling convention, the United States believes that the lethal research on whales they propose is 

The Pelly Amendment cited by Reeker authorizes the president to bar the importation of products from countries engaged in ocean fishing or hunting programs that reduce the effectiveness of international endangered-species accords. 

In recent years, the United States has also threatened sanctions against Japan for similar whale hunts for self-described scientific purposes, but penalties have been waived in favor of negotiations to reduce the Japanese whale harvest. 

The planned whale harvest by Iceland would be its first in 14 years, and was defended by the country's fisheries minister, Arni Mathiesen, as an "undisputed right" of all member countries of the International Whaling Commission. 

He said it is just as legal as whaling now conducted by other countries including Japan, Norway and the United States, a reference to the limited hunt by native people in the Arctic region of Alaska. 

The decision drew domestic criticism from the Icelandic tourist industry, which warned that environmentally-minded visitors would cancel trips to the North Atlantic island country.