Orlando

Dannis Bish, an Orlando firefighter shown here on his Facebook page with his wife, Jayne, was killed and his spouse critically injured when his Harley was struck Saturday by a 16-year-old driver in a Mustang who made an improper left turn into their path in East Orange County. The Bishes had been in Volusia County the day before for Bike Week and it's unclear if they and another biker friend riding his own Harley and injured, were returning home from the biker event when the accident occurred.

DAYTONA BEACH -- Already with the opening three-day weekend of Bike Week gone, two bikers have lost their lives -- one near Pierson and the other in Orlando, according to the Florida Highway Patrol.

Palatka property to come under his area of responsibility

DAYTONA BEACH -- The Florida General Baptist Convention has elevated the Rev. Dr. L. Ronald Durham to its vice presidency.

Durham is senior pastor of Daytona Beach's Greater Friendship Baptist Church, 539 George W. Engram Blvd.

“I deem this an honor, for which I am truly thankful,” Durham said Monday, adding, “This was not something I was seeking, but it’s wonderful to be recognized state-wide, and I do not take this lightly.”

Through Orlando Magic Youth Fund, a McCormick Foundation fund, $1 million-plus distributed 3rd straight year to 17 Central Florida non-profits organizations

Magic photo / Headline Surfer /

ORLANDO -- The Orlando Magic's Jameer Nelson was named winner of the 2012-'13 Rich & Helen DeVos Community Enrichment Award Saturday night at the 23rd Annual Orlando Magic Youth Foundation (OMYF) Black Tie & Tennies Gala presented by FAIRWINDS Credit Union held at the Amway Center.

ORLANDO -- State law enforcers are asking the public's help in coming forward with any information on a 46-year-old Orlando man who may have solicited for sex of children or involvement of human trafficking beyond two alledged victims -- a father and son, following the suspect's arrest.

Agents with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement's Miami Regional Operations Center Cyber/High-Tech Crimes squad arrested Donald W. Purviance, 46, of Orlando, on charges of solicitation of a parent, human trafficking, soliciting the procurement of a minor for prostitution and attempted lewd and lascivious battery.

The investigation began last year, following an anonymous tip, when Purviance lived in Biscayne Park, FDLE spokeswoman Gretl Plessinger said. She said Purviance moved to Orlando (20156 Quinlan St.) last September, and in February, allegedly solicited an undercover agent he thought was the parent of a 14-year-old son. 

"Purviance offered to pay $750 in exchange for sex with the father and the son," Plessinger said. "FDLE agents arrested Purviance in Sumter County on Monday without incident. Agents believe there could be additional victims."

ORLANDO -- America! Land of the free, and home of the brave -- arid lands thirsting for the twilight of individual liberty, vibrantly ambitious of fertile, national loins, begging, reaching -- grasping for change. The election is Tuesday. Tuesday!

Is it a wave? That monsoon the Nixon beasts used to always scream about back in the 1970s before the humiliation of Watergate -- of Watergate! A corrupting, unmitigated disaster, perhaps, for one of the greatest intellectual minds ever to mind the shop of the presidency.

Gertrude Bazin, 37, of Kissimmee, is in serious condition this morning at at Osceola Regional Hospital after reportedly losing control of her Nissan and driving into a retention pond. A passenger died in the Thuesday evening accident.

KISSIMMEE -- A 41-year-old Orlando man who was a passenger in a car died Thursday night after the driver lost control of the vehicle on Fairweather Way near Flack Court and landed in a retention pond, the Florida Highway Patrol said.

The driver, 37-year-old Gertrude Bazin of Kissimmee, and the passenger, whose name was not released, were able to free themselves from her 2002 Nissan 4-door, but her passenger was pronounced dead at the scene of the 7:20 p.m. accident. It wasn't clear from a report whether the passenger drowned or succumbed to injury.

Ormond Beach resident new CFO for operation that includes branches in Port Orange, Kissimmee, Orlando and St. Augustine

Photo for Headline Surfer / Christine Thomas of Ormond Beach, shown here, has moved up to one of the top administrative posts in banking in the Sunshine State.

TAVARES -- When politicians ask if she's better off now than she was four years ago, Ormond Beach's Christine "Chris" Thomas can answer in the affirmative. But not because of anything government has done.

In these four short years, Thomas has worked her way up the business ladder to senior vice president controller at Reunion Bank of Florida and now she's the Tavares-based bank's chief financial officer.

DAYTONA BEACH -- The News-Journal and its sister papers are following the lead of The New York Times in charging readers to access its online content as print media struggles to find a happy medium with keeping its broadsheet advertising in place while losing readers in droves to the Internet.

Ironically, The Times unloaded its Florida papers in a fire sale to the News-Journal's parent company, Halifax Media, earlier this year.