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www.LouisBerkLaw.com 407-906-0500 October 2021
Car Accidents | Truck Accidents | Pedestrian Accidents | Slip & Fall/Premises Liability | Wrongful Death
October Is for Celebrating Anniversaries, Birthdays, and Don’t Forget Halloween!
October is always an exhilarating month for everyone. Many people look forward to Halloween and spend a lot of time planning for it. Having the opportunity to dress up and be something that you’re not with friends and family is that one time of year where you can really let loose and step outside of your comfort zone a bit. If you dress up for work, you get to stay in costume all day, which is all the more fun. Plus, it’s a great excuse to eat candy! The month of October is also long anticipated for us here in Florida because things finally start to cool down a bit, and fall is on the horizon, bringing the holiday season along with it. Summer is fun and exciting, but it can feel like that heat lingers around a little too long. I first came to the U.S. when I was 10 years old. In Venezuela, we did not celebrate Halloween, and the only time I got to dress up was the Jewish holiday Purim. Therefore, on my first Halloween at age 10, I recall being so thrilled to dress up and head out with my sister, cousins, and friends for a night of trick-or-treating. I carried a pumpkin basket with me to fill up with candy. Well, soon, that basket was overflowing with all of my favorite types of candy, and I decided that the basket was just not going to work out. The following year, I brought a pillowcase with me to collect my candy. As the years passed, we soon figured out which houses and areas gave out the best candy — some even gave full-sized candy bars! Because Halloween did not start for me until I was 10, I quickly outgrew my trick-or-treating years and moved on to having fun with my friends in my teenage years. My wife of three years, Marisa, is a Halloween baby, born on Oct. 31, and all nine years we have been together, Halloween has been a staple for us. It is always a celebration and full of fun and happiness. Around this time, we usually take a trip to Disney World, where we have a blast spending time together at the park and Epcot’s Food and Wine Festival.
October is also our anniversary — on Oct. 7 three years ago, I said “ I do ” to the most important person in my life: Marisa Berk. I cannot imagine my life without her and am so grateful for every moment spent with her. This year, I anticipate we will go out for a nice dinner and possibly get a hotel for the evening and make a small
staycation out of it. After all, it’s always fun to pretend to be tourists in Orlando!
October starts out great for me as I celebrate my marriage and ends with a huge celebration for my wife’s birthday and Halloween — it sure is a crazy month. I am wishing everyone a safe and Happy Halloween! Bring on the holidays! -Louis Bernardo Berk www.LouisBerkLaw.com | 1
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Man Sues Woman for Texting During a Movie Date
for the movie ticket he’d paid for. If she didn’t pay, he threatened to go after the money in small claims court. When Cruz initially refused, Vezmar made good on his threat and filed a petition in Austin, Texas. Vezmar made the case that Cruz had violated the cinema’s no cellphone policy and had negatively impacted his and other moviegoers’ experiences of watching a raccoon and a talking tree (among other beings) save the day. He claimed that while he sought modest damages, it was the principle of the thing that really mattered to him. He called Cruz’s behavior “a threat to civilized society.” As entertaining as it might have been to see that case fully make its way through the legal system, the lawsuit was eventually dropped after the TV show “Inside Edition” reunited Cruz and Vezmar and filmed her paying him back for the date. As the camera rolled, he counted his cash and considered them square. Unlike “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” there were no good guys in this story — but that doesn’t make it any less entertaining to read about after the fact!
We’ve probably all found ourselves annoyed with someone who uses their phone during a movie at the theater, but have you ever been so annoyed that you sued them?
That’s what Texas resident Brandon Vezmar decided to do back in 2017, following a “first date from hell” (as Vezmar put it) with
Crystal Cruz. According to Vezmar, about 15 minutes into “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” Cruz was texting on her phone. When Vezmar asked her to stop texting, she refused. Then, Vezmar suggested that she step outside of the theater to text. Cruz took his suggestion and never returned.
Most people would chalk the experience up to a bad date and
move on, but Vezmar was so indignant that he reached out to Cruz the next day and requested that she compensate him $4 for the pizza and $17
Corn Mazes Date Back to Ancient Greece? A Historical Look at This Wacky Fall Tradition
Exploring a corn maze is a great way to get outside and enjoy the fall season with friends and family — but who came up with the idea of wandering around a corn field for fun? As it turns out, outdoor mazes are an ancient tradition, and the American corn maze of the ‘90s sprouted from the mazes of 17th-century European gardens. Don’t believe it? Here’s a quick tour of corn maze history. The Minotaur and the Maze Have you heard of Theseus and the Minotaur? This ancient Greek legend tells the story of the hero Theseus, who ventured into an elaborate maze to kill the half-man, half-bull imprisoned there. The monstrous Minotaur was known to eat heroes, and the labyrinth was known to trap them, but Theseus managed to slay the Minotaur and find his way home with the help of a string that he unspooled as he walked. This story isn’t the first recorded example of a maze or labyrinth — according to the World History encyclopedia, “[L]abyrinths and labyrinthine symbols have been dated to the Neolithic Age in regions as diverse as modern-day Turkey, Ireland, Greece, and India, among others” — but it’s perhaps the most famous ancient tale. If you’ve ever navigated a Halloween corn maze staffed by ghouls and ghosts, you can see the parallels! Garden Art to Get Lost In Mazes formed from bushes began popping up European gardens in the 17th century. They were a popular artistic feature of upper-class gardens in England, more for looking at than solving. One famous
example is the half-mile-long Hampton Maze, which was planted in 1690 and still stands today. The Corn Maze: An American Invention Garden mazes eventually hopped the pond to America but didn’t become interactive puzzles until Don Frantz, Creative Director of the American Maze Company, came on the scene. In 1993, Frantz created the “first ever cornfield maze for private and public entertainment” to attract college kids in Pennsylvania. Today, every small-town corn maze is a descendant of his “Amazing Maize Maze.” To learn more about that wacky history, visit AmericanMaze.com.
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TAKE A BREAK
If you had to get surgery in the early 1800s, it could be a death sentence. Before the invention of anesthesia, patients needing amputations and other operations were awake and lucid the entire time. Plus, surgery looked more like something from a horror movie than a lifesaving procedure. And it was during this era that Dr. Robert Liston, who was ironically considered one of the best surgeons of his day, performed the deadliest surgery of all time. Before getting into the particulars of what transpired during the surgery itself, you should know a little bit about Dr. Liston. Sure, he was a professional surgeon, but he was also a product of his time. He likely worked with dirty saws and knives while wearing a bloody apron in an unsanitary operating room. He was also named the “fastest knife in the West End” by medical historian Dr. Richard Gordon. He was known for performing surgeries very quickly, which, in the days before anesthesia, was as much as patients could hope for on the operating table. Only 1 in 10 of his patients died on the operating table, which sounds bad until you learn that a nearby hospital reported 1 in 4 people dying from similar procedures. Also, in those days, much like crowds used to gather to watch a hanging, people found amputations to be morbidly entertaining — and who wouldn’t want to watch the fastest knife in the West End at work? PERFORMED BY THE ‘FASTEST KNIFE IN THE WEST END’ THE DEADLIEST SURGERY IN HISTORY
HALLOWEEN COOKIE PIZZA
Inspired by Pillsbury.com
Image sourced from Pillsbury.com/recipes/halloween-cookie-pizza/67172821-ddfb-49ce-b658-ddc4ef4b5cf3
So, on the fateful day of that deadly surgery, Dr. Liston, ever the showman, cut through his patient’s broken, infected leg with incredible speed — so incredible that he didn’t realize he had cut off two of his assistant’s fingers in the process. Both later died of gangrene (remember the unsanitary tools?). But theirs were not the only deaths that day. When Dr. Liston went for one of his knives, he whipped it about a little too closely to one spectator, slicing through his coat. While he didn’t actually break the man’s skin with his knife, the spectator thought he’d been stabbed and died of shock right there in the operating room. So, instead of saving one life, Dr. Liston killed three people. It’s the only known surgery to have resulted in a 300% mortality rate.
This one’s for the candy corn lovers! This “pizza” is far from traditional, but once you try it, you might find yourself making it every October!
Ingredients
• 1 cup candy corn • 1/2 cup chocolate chips • 1/4 cup vanilla frosting
• 1 roll Pillsbury Sugar Cookie Dough • 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
(store-bought or homemade)
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 F. 2. Grease a round, 12-inch pan and line with cookie dough, ensuring the dough covers all but the outer 1/2 inch. 3. Bake for 16–20 minutes until golden brown. Cool completely. 4. Spread the peanut butter over the cooled cookie dough, then sprinkle on the candy corn and chocolate chips. 5. In a small bowl, microwave the frosting for 15 seconds or until liquified. 6. Drizzle the frosting over the “pizza,” slice, and serve!
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INSIDE THIS ISSUE
October Is for Celebrating
1
Man Sues Woman for Texting During a Movie Date Corn Mazes Date Back to Ancient Greece?
2
Halloween Cookie Pizza The Deadliest Surgery in History
3
The Tiger King Remains Behind Bars
4
The Tiger King Remains Behind Bars Judges Deny Joe Exotic’s Appeal
scheme. Victims are allowed to attend court proceedings so long as the judge decides their testimony (if they are also a witness) will not be affected by their attendance. Maldonado-Passage’s legal team asserted that Baskin was not a victim of any sort, since the murder-for-hire plot did not result in her murder. However, U.S. Circuit Court judges ruled that she still suffered emotional and financial harm because of the incident. In addition to this, since Maldonado-Passage conspired to have Baskin murdered two different times, the judge at his trial in 2019 had incorrectly considered them as two separate plots, rather than two attempts at the same murder. The U.S. Circuit Court judges ordered the trial judge to resentence him. So, even for all that trouble, Maldonado-Passage remains behind bars. However, so long as the Tiger King’s popularity continues, it won’t be surprising if Joe Exotic and his legal team keep searching for ways to get him out of prison.
Even more than a year after the release of “Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness,” Joseph Maldonado-Passage, more popularly known as Joe Exotic, continues to make headlines. Following the fame that came with having his story at the center of a wildly popular Netflix series, Maldonado-Passage saw fit to appeal his 22-year prison sentence for plotting to murder big cat rescue activist Carole Baskin on a few different grounds. However, in July, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected his appeal. The primary reason for Maldonado-Passage’s appeal, as reported by his legal team, was that Baskin was allowed to attend the entirety of Maldonado-Passage’s trial, despite her role as a witness in the case. As a general rule, witnesses are not permitted to attend proceedings in their entirety, as other witness testimonies might affect the objectivity of their own testimony.
However, Baskin was also in attendance at the trial as a victim, since she was the target of Maldonado-Passage’s murder-for-hire
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www.LouisBerkLaw.com 407-906-0500 October 2021
Car Accidents | Truck Accidents | Pedestrian Accidents | Slip & Fall/Premises Liability | Wrongful Death
Octubre es para celebrar Aniversarios, cumpleaños y no olvides ¡Víspera de Todos los Santos!
Octubre es siempre un mes emocionante para todo el mundo. Mucha gente espera ansiosamente a Halloween e invierte mucho tiempo en los preparativos. Uno tiene la oportunidad de vestirse para la ocasión y ser una persona diferente junto a los amigos y familiares. Es la única vez en el año en la que uno puede realmente liberarse y salirse un poco de su zona de confort. Si te vistes elegantemente para el trabajo, puedes quedarte disfrazado todo el día, lo cual es todavía más divertido. Además, ¡es un pretexto perfecto para comer chucherías! Los que vivimos en Florida también esperamos ansiosamente la llegada de Octubre porque el clima finalmente empieza a refrescar y empezamos a vislumbrar la llegada del otoño y, con él, la temporada de fiestas. El verano es divertido y emocionante, pero a veces podemos llegar a sentir que el calor se ha quedado con nosotros demasiado tiempo. Vine a los Estados Unidos cuando tenía 10 años. En Venezuela no celebrábamos Halloween, y la única vez en que podía usar ropa elegante era para la festividad judía de Purim. Por eso recuerdo que en mi primer Halloween, con 10 años de edad, estaba muy entusiasmado por disfrazarme y salir con mi hermana, mis primos y mis amigos para disfrutar de una noche de pedir chucherías. Llevaba una canasta en forma de calabaza y planeaba llenarla de caramelitos y chocolates. Me di cuenta rápidamente de que la canasta se desbordaba con todas mis chucherías preferidas y que la cosa no iba a funcionar. Al año siguiente salí con una funda de almohada para recoger las chucherías. Con el correr de los años, fuimos descubriendo cuáles casas y zonas regalaban las mejores chucherías, ¡algunos incluso regalaban barras de Twix y KitKat enteras! Como descubrí Halloween recién a los 10 años de edad, los años de pedir chucherías dieron lugar rápidamente a la adolescencia y a divertirme con mis amigos. Mi esposa Marisa, con quien llevo tres años de casado, es hija de Halloween; nació un 31 de Octubre. Y a lo largo de los nueve años que llevamos juntos, Halloween ha sido siempre fundamental para nosotros. Siempre ha sido una celebración llena de alegría y diversión. Habitualmente viajamos a Disney cerca de esa fecha
y lo pasamos genial en el parque de diversiones y el Festival Internacional de Comida y Vino de Epcot.
Nuestro aniversario también cae en octubre. Hace tres años, el 7 de octubre, le dije “sí, quiero” a la persona más importante en mi vida, Marisa Berk. No podría imaginar mi vida sin ella y agradezco cada instante que pasamos juntos. Este año, espero que salgamos a cenar a un lugar lindo y, tal vez, pasemos la noche en un hotel, algo así como unas “vacaciones en casa”. Después de todo, ¡siempre es divertido hacer de cuenta que somos turistas en Orlando!
Para mí, Octubre empieza genial porque celebramos nuestro matrimonio y termina con una gran celebración por el cumpleaños y mi esposa y Halloween. Todo el mes es una locura. ¡Le deseo a todo el mundo un Halloween seguro y feliz! ¡Que comiencen las fiestas!
www.LouisBerkLaw.com | 1 -Louis Bernardo Berk
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Hombre demanda a mujer por enviar mensajes de texto mientras veían una película
la pizza y 17 por las entradas de cine. Amenazó con que, si no le pagaba, exigiría su dinero en el juzgado de paz. Después de que Cruz se negara inicialmente a pagarle, Vezmar cumplió con su amenaza y presentó la demanda en Austin, Texas. El argumento de Vezmar es que Cruz violó la política de no usar celulares en la sala del cine y había afectado negativamente la experiencia del propio Vezmar en el cine así como la de todos los presentes al momento de ver a un mapache y un árbol (entre otros seres) evitar una catástrofe. Afirmó que, aunque buscaba compensación por los modestos perjuicios, para él esto realmente era una cuestión de principios. Calificó al comportamiento de Cruz como “una amenaza para la sociedad civilizada”. A pesar de que hubiera sido realmente entretenido ver cómo se iba desarrollando el caso en el sistema legal, se abandonó la demanda después de que el programa de televisión “Inside Edition” reuniera a Cruz y a Vezmar y filmaran cómo ella le devolvía el dinero de la cita. Mientras la cámara grababa, él contó el dinero y consideró que las cuentas estaban saldadas. A diferencia de “Guardianes de la Galaxia Vol. 2”, no pudimos encontrar a “los buenos” en esta historia ... ¡Pero no por eso deja de ser entretenido leer sobre lo que sucedió!
Probablemente todos nos hemos molestado porque había alguien usando su celular durante una película en el cine, ¿pero alguna vez estuviste tan enojado como para demandarlos? Eso es lo que Brandon Vezmar, residente Texas, decidió hacer en el 2017, después de tener una “primera cita infernal” (como lo puso Vezmar) con Crystal Cruz. Según Vezmar, a los 15 minutos de haber comenzado “Guardianes de la Galaxia
Vol. 2”, Cruz estaba enviando mensajes en su celular. Cuando Vezmar le pidió que dejara de hacerlo, ella se negó. Luego, Vezmar le sugirió que se fuera de la sala para enviar
mensajes de texto. Cruz siguió su consejo y jamás regresó.
La mayoría de la gente lo dejaría como una mala cita y
seguiría con su vida, pero Vezmar estaba tan indignado que se contactó con Cruz al día siguiente y le pidió que lo resarciera por el dinero que había pagado: 4 USD por
Esto es para los amantes de los caramelos de maíz. Esta “pizza” dista mucho de ser tradicional, pero una vez que la pruebes, ¡puede que te encuentres haciéndola cada octubre!
Ingredientes
• 1/2 taza de chispas de chocolate • 1/4 taza de glaseado de
• 1 rollo de masa de galletas • con azúcar de Pillsbury • 1/2 taza de mantequilla • de maní cremosa • 1 taza de caramelos de maíz
vainilla (comprado o hecho en casa)
Instrucciones
1. Precalienta el horno a 350 F. 2. Engrasa un molde redondo de 12 pulgadas y cúbrelo con la masa de galletas. Asegúrate de que la masa cubra toda la superficie, excepto 1/2 pulgada en las orillas. 3. Hornea durante 16 a 20 minutos hasta que se vea dorada. Deja enfriar por completo. 4. Esparce la mantequilla de maní sobre la masa de galletas ya fría y luego dispersa los caramelos de maíz y las chispas de chocolate. 5. En un tazón pequeño, calienta el glaseado en el microondas
Pizza de galletas para Halloween
Inspirado por Pillsbury.com Imagen procedente de Pillsbury.com/recipes/halloween-cookie-pizza/ 67172821-ddfb-49ce-b658-ddc4ef4b5cf3
durante 15 segundos o hasta que esté derretido. 6. ¡Rocía el glaseado sobre la “pizza”, corta y sirve!
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