Cycling news

‘Chokers’ wild!

Label: Health

Now they’ve both been acquitted of throttling transsexuals.

Kinky FDNY hunk Taylor Murphy, who successfully fought off felony strangulation charges brought by his jealous, blond, pre-op transsexual ex-girlfriend, is now dating another woman wannabe with a far more serious strangulation on her rap sheet.

Brunette pre-op transsexual Wanda Batista, 32, was all smiling and supportive of Murphy as she walked arm-in-arm with him at Manhattan Supreme Court last week, batting her eyelashes and calling him her “giant teddy bear.”

But in December 2004, the towering Batista was tried on charges she had fatally choked her transsexual pimp — and in a bizarre karmic twist, Batista was acquitted by a Brooklyn jury, just as her beefy fireman would be in Manhattan eight years later.

Steven Hirsch

NICE PAIR: Taylor Murphy, cleared of choking one transsexual lover, leaves court with another, Wanda Batista, who was acquitted of a strangle slay.

“The motive was money,” a law-enforcement source told The Post of the 2004 case. “They went there to rob her and ended up killing her,” the source said of victim Paola Matos, 31, a post-op transsexual who was found dead in the bedroom of her Bay Ridge apartment brothel.

“Police believed she was the killer — just the jury didn’t believe it,” the source said of Batista, who was a 24-year-old admitted prostitute at the time she was charged with choking Matos with her hands in a dispute over $4,000 Batista had allegedly made turning tricks but had failed to turn over to the doomed madam.

Batista — whose first name then was Fernando — fled to Puerto Rico after the killing, but was arrested there and brought back for trial, the source said. Jurors acquitted her of murder but hung on a charge of manslaughter. The case was not retried.

Last week, in the audience at her hunky hose-handler’s own choking trial — he was acquitted of the nonfatal assault against Claudia Charriez, 31 — Batista turned ashen, then waved her hand dismissively when asked by a reporter about her old strangulation rap.

Batista — who, like Charriez, has an active escort ad online, hers under the name Vanity Bucci — declined to comment.

Murphy was acquitted Thursday of choking Charriez in their Midtown hotel-room bed, but convicted of felony criminal contempt for contacting her in more than 1,000 phone calls, texts and e-mails, in violation of an order of protection.

He is due to be sentenced Feb. 20 by Manhattan Supreme Court Justice A. Kirke Bartley, and faces anywhere from no jail time to four years in prison.

dauer@nypost.com

Five years after the recession, a slow recovery plods on

Label: Business

Five years ago this month, the Great Recession began. Which leads to this question: How much longer until South Florida can erase the damage?

Officially, the recession ended in June 2009. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the national economy began contracting in December 2007 and did not grow again for 19 months. Using taxable sales figures, it’s probably safe to say South Florida experienced a longer downturn. Overall spending contracted for the first time in South Florida in March 2007 and didn’t post a year-over-year gain until February 2010.

“Miami was at the forefront of the housing boom and bust,’’ said Karl Kuykendall, an economist who follows South Florida for IHS Global Insight. “It’s no surprise Miami was early into the recession and somewhat late coming out.”

But whatever the actual duration of the downturn, it doesn’t take much math to realize the economy still feels shaky. South Florida lost its first net job in more than two years in October, when a tiny decline of 300 payroll slots interrupted 26 months of consistent expansion. The upcoming November report out Friday will show whether the losing streak continues.

And while unemployment is off near-record highs set in April 2010, more than 180,000 South Floridians were listed as officially out of work in the last count. That’s almost 90 percent more than the 98,000 people listed as out of work in the first month of the recession.

Tourism posted an early recovery, particularly in Miami-Dade, where foreign visitors helped hotels shake-off a sharp drop in U.S. vacationers and business travelers. But the recession lingers in Broward’s tourism industry, which is just now retiring past records.

Housing suffered the most dramatic crash throughout the recession and was also the last of the major indicators to begin its recovery. The Case-Shiller real estate index pegs May 2006 as the peak of the bubble in South Florida. Although each neighborhood is different, the average South Florida house worth $200,000 that month would have fallen down to $97,600 by the time the market hit bottom just over a year ago, in November 2011.

Values have recovered 9 percent since then, meaning the same house should be worth just over $105,0000. That’s a loss of 47 percent over six years.

Recovering from that kind of crash takes time, and five years clearly isn’t enough. To give a hint of the progress underway, Business Monday checked into businesses and residents on the frontlines of the recovery. The reports follow:

Housing

After fending off a foreclosure and battling to get out from under an onerous option ARM mortgage, Marie and Wilson Destin recently worked out a loan modification on their 4-bedroom, 2-bathroom house near Miami Lakes.

With the help of Neighborhood Housing Services of South Florida, a nonprofit agency that helps people navigate the Byzantine home financing landscape, the Destins cut their monthly mortgage payment to $1,500 from $1,900 under a new fixed-rate loan.

In 2006, when the housing market was booming, the Haitian-American couple had taken out an option ARM loan on the property, which they had owned for several years.

“Somebody came to the house and approached me with an option ARM loan,’’ said Wilson Destin. “They said I would pay less.’’

The option ARM — which has triggered financial woes for thousands of homeowners during the downturn — allowed for flexible payments and negative amortization, practically encouraging people to defer payments.

7-year-old in critical condition after accident

Label: World

Police were investigating an accident involving a 7-year-old who was struck by a vehicle in a Lauderhill neighborhood late Saturday, Lauderhill Police spokesman Rick Rocco said.

The vehicle and its driver, who has not yet been identified, remained on scene after the incident near the intersection of Northwest 27th Court and 56th Avenue.

The child was transported to Broward Health Medical Center in critical condition immediately after the incident, police said.

Details of the accident were not immediately available.

This post will be updated as we receive more information.

Why does Google build apps for its rival Apple’s iPhone?

Label: Technology

Why help a key competitor? Two words: Advertising and data

There isn’t any other way to say it: Apple and Google really don’t like each other. Apple CEO Steve Jobs vowed to destroy the Google geniuses behind the Android operating system for allegedly stealing the basic mechanics of the iPhone. Apple and Google-partner Samsung are constantly at one another’s throats over patents. And most recently new Apple CEO Tim Cook gave two of Google’s most popular products — Google Maps and YouTube — the boot from iOS 6.

Then the unthinkable happened: Fans started turning on Apple. Even the most gushy tech critic had to admit that Apple’s replacement for Google Maps was a train wreck, a rare blight on the company’s otherwise stainless track record (a failure, notes Zara Kessler at Bloomberg, which ironically might ultimately benefit Apple).

Why, then, would Google throw its chief rival a life preserver this week and deliver Google Maps to iOS — as well as handing over Chrome and an awesome new Gmail app in recent weeks? Two main reasons:

1. Potential advertising: “Google doesn’t make money off of Android which is open source; they make money when people use Google services,” Joel Spolsky, CEO of Stack Overflow, tells Wired. Google Maps on the iPhone doesn’t have ads yet, although the Android version does. In the end, Google’s primary concern is to get its services in front of as many eyeballs as possible — even if those eyeballs are peering into an iPhone.

SEE MORE: Steve Jobs’ mysterious iMac-controlled yacht

2. More data with which to make its products better: Google Maps is every marketer’s dream. Mapping software gives them invaluable consumer data to work with, like the city you live in, the stores you shop at, the restaurants you frequent, where you get your coffee, and much, much more. “Google needs the traffic that iOS users bring,” says Casey Newton at CNET. Those millions of iPhone owners unknowingly feed Google the analytics it needs to make Google Maps the superior, celebrated product it’s become. The same goes for Chrome. And Gmail.

And “Google is hardly the first company to aggressively support a rival platform for selfish reasons,” says Ryan Tate at Wired.

Microsoft was a strong backer of Apple’s Macintosh for decades because its core business was selling applications [Word, Excel, etc.], not Microsoft’s competing operating system Windows… Google’s willingness to ship iOS apps could look smarter as time goes on. The company trounces Apple when it comes to all things cloud, not just maps and e-mail; its social network, search engine, and highly optimized data centers could give its iOS apps an even bigger edge in the coming years.

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Riveting Details Emerge from CT School Rampage

Label: Lifestyle

As morning turned to afternoon on Friday, further details continued to emerge from Newtown, CT, a tight-knit community shaken by a massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School that took the lives of innocent students and teachers, in addition to the gunman, reportedly identified as Adam Lanza.

RELATED: President Fights Tears as He Addresses Nation

As President Barack Obama touched on in his tear-jerking press conference, this is not the first time the nation has witnessed a tragedy of this kind. The recent mass shooting at an Aurora, CO movie theater is just one instance of such violence. Columbine High School and Virginia Tech also resonate as prime examples.

Hollywood's biggest stars were quick to react to the news on Twitter and made an outcry for stricter gun control regulations.

Watch the video for ET's complete coverage of today's biggest headline.

RELATED: Celebs Tweet Reactions to CT School Shooting

Mike’s plan to butt in

Label: Health

Mayor Bloomberg just won’t butt out.

The city is recruiting foot soldiers for a stealth war against smoking cigarettes in your apartment, planning documents obtained by The Post reveal.

Community groups are being asked to convince tenants and property managers to turn their private buildings into butt-free abodes — the latest front in the Health Department and Mayor Bloomberg’s anti-smoking crusade, according to a recently released “request for proposal” document.

The groups would “work with property managers, tenants, and others on adoption of voluntary smoke-free policies by housing entities reaching one to two multi-unit buildings (containing a minimum of 30 units total),” the document urges.

For their efforts, a community group will collect a $10,000 bounty — paid for out of a Centers for Disease Control grant.

The secret salvo comes a year after the city banned smoking in parks and beaches, and after Bloomberg and Health Commissioner Thomas Farley said there were no plans to expand a butt ban to apartment buildings.

Released by the Health Department’s nonprofit arm, Partnership for a Healthier New York City, the document solicits “neighborhood contractors” to “support and advance” its agenda in four separate areas of concern: tobacco, alcohol, exercise and diet.

Along with “improving community awareness and compliance with existing tobacco-related laws and regulations,” groups are asked to promote “voluntary adoption of smoke-free policies to reduce tobacco use and exposure to secondhand smoke,” the document reads.

The latest maneuver left critics fuming.

“They are liars!” charged Audrey Silk, founder of the Brooklyn-based Citizens Lobbying Against Smoker Harassment. “They acclimate the public to a ban, and then they go after the final frontier of our freedom — our homes!”

The city insisted there was no ban plan.

“The city is not banning smoking in private residences; as part of this federal grant, organizations can apply to fund projects that, among other things, educate the community on voluntary smoke-free housing policies,” Bloomberg spokesperson Samantha Levine said.

There are no laws prohibiting a landlord from banning smoking, according to real-estate lawyer Adam Leitman Bailey. Landlords need only change the language of the lease, and once it’s time to renew, the smoker can decide to move or stay.

Rent-regulated tenants who smoke are in luck: Landlords are stuck with the original lease signed with the tenant, and “none of these ban smoking,” he said.

Co-ops and condos that choose to ban smoking would need about 66 percent of tenants to approve, Bailey added.

The city banned smoking at most restaurants in 1995, and in 2002, Bloomberg inked the law banning smoking in bars and the bar area of restaurants.

Some welcome a ban in buildings.

“Then I wouldn’t have smoke complaints, so that would be a good thing,” said Paul Herman, president of the management division at Brown Harris Stevens. “But I don’t know how well New Yorkers would take to being legislated.”

The document notes that although the number of smokers in the city has dropped over the past 10 years, about 14 percent of adults (about 850,000) and 8.4 percent percent of high school students (about 18,000) still light up.

But a plan to attack other vices appears more vague: under alcohol, for example, contractors are simply asked to “engage” schools and churches “to facilitate learning and discussion about alcohol and its impact on their communities.”

Proposals are due tomorrow, and the city will notify winning proposals on Jan. 22. Contracts span about seven months, and can be renewed.

gbuiso@nypost.com

Miami in spotlight at AVCC, other entrepreneurship events

Label: Business

Entrepreneurs from around the world took the stage during this packed week of entrepreneurship events in Miami: Florida International University’s Americas Venture Capital Conference (known as AVCC), HackDay, Wayra’s Global DemoDay and Endeavor’s International Selection Panel.

The events, all part of the first Innovate MIA week, also put the spotlight on Miami as it continues to try to develop into a technology hub for the Americas.

“While I like art, I absolutely love what is happening today... The time has come to become a tech hub in Miami,” said Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos A. Gimenez, who kicked off the venture capital conference on Thursday. He told the audience of 450 investors and entrepreneurs about the county’s $1 million investment in the Launch Pad Tech Accelerator in downtown Miami.

“I have no doubt that this gathering today will produce new ideas and new business ventures that will put our community on a fast track to becoming a center for innovative, tech-driven entrepreneurship,” Gimenez said.

Brad Feld, an early-stage investor and a founder of TechStars, cautioned that won’t happen overnight. Building a startup community can take five, 10, even 15 years, and those leading the effort, who should be entrepreneurs themselves, need to take the long-term view, he told the audience via video. “You can create very powerful entrepreneurial ecosystems in any city... I’ve spent some time in Miami, I think you are off to a great start.”

Throughout the two-day AVCC at the JW Brickell Marriott, as well as the Endeavor and Wayra events, entrepreneurs from around the world pitched their companies, hoping to persuade investors to part with some of their green.

And in some cases, the entrepreneurs could win money, too. During the venture capital conference, 29 companies —including eight from South Florida such as itMD, which connects doctors, patients and imaging facilities to facilitate easy access of records — competed for more than $50,000 in cash and prizes through short “elevator’’ pitches. Each took questions from the judges, then demoed their products or services in the conference “Hot Zone,” a room adjoining the ballroom. Some companies like oLyfe, a platform to organize what people share online, are hoping to raise funds for expansion into Latin America. Others like Ideame, a trilingual crowdfunding platform, were laser focused on pan-Latin American opportunities.

Winning the grand prize of $15,000 in cash and art was Trapezoid Digital Security of Miami, which provides hardware-based security solutions for enterprise and cloud environments. Fotopigeon of Tampa, a photo-sharing and printing service targeting the military and prison niches, scored two prizes.

The conference offered opportunities to hear formal presentations on current trends — among them the surge of start-ups in Brazil; the importance of mobile apps and overheated company valuations — and informal opportunities to connect with fellow entrepreneurs.

Speakers included Gaston Legorburu of SapientNitro, Albert Santalo of CareCloud and Juan Diego Calle of .Co Internet, all South Florida entrepreneurs. Jerry Haar, executive director of FIU’s Pino Global Entrepreneurship Center, which produced the conference with a host of sponsors, said the organizers worked hard to make the conference relevant to both the local and Latin American audience, with panels on funding and recruiting for startups, for instance.

Miami photographer sentenced to 10 years in child-porn case

Label: World

A Miami-area photographer who secretly videotaped children while they changed clothes in his home studio was sentenced in federal court Friday to 10 years in prison.

Diego Tobias Matrajt, 37, pleaded guilty in September to distribution and possession of child pornography.

Last February, Matrajt distributed 10 images of child pornography to an undercover agent by using a peer-to-peer file sharing program, according to court records.

In April, FBI agents did a search of his home and computers, uncovering 26 video images of boys and girls changing clothes alone in a guest bedroom with their genitalia exposed, records show.

Matrajt admitted surreptitiously video recording children under the age of 12 as they changed clothes in the guest bedroom during photo shoots.