Nick and Sofia

Sofia Vergara, one of the stars of the Emmy-winning ABC sitcom Modern Family, tweeted this photo of her boytoy, former Florida Senate and Delray Beach City Commission candidate Nick Loeb, after he underwent surgery in an L.A. hospital.

Loeb, 35, drove off a cliff in the swanky Los Angeles area of Bel-Air last week and sustained serious injuries. He was in the ICU at UCLA Medical Center for several days but his health has been improving.

“How can someone look so handsome after six hours in an operating room. Luv UUU!,” Vergara wrote in her tweet.

(Click here for photos of Vergara and Loeb’s ex)

Ross, and George

Surprise, surprise!

Radio personality Jennifer Ross, who was canned a year ago from WRMF-97.9 FM’s morning show and replaced by younger, cheaper talent, is returning to the station — but not to the airwaves.

Ross, 52, is scheduled to take over as director of community affairs next week, said station boss Elizabeth Hamma. The job’s description is unclear. Hamma declined to comment further.

In an email to Page2Live, Ross wrote:  “I’m thrilled about the opportunity.  As you know, I’ve always been committed to the community, as has WRMF, so this is the perfect opportunity for me.  I’m looking forward to continuing my relationship with the WRMF team and great things for the future.”

A station insider who asked not to be identified said the move makes sense for both WRMF and the woman who ruled local morning radio for 25 years.

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Lappin

Some business practices at the Palm Beach Pops are leaving the orchestra founded by maestro Bob Lappin exposed to lawsuits and the scrutiny of the IRS, forensic accountants have told the non-profit.

Red-flagged by the Alpern Rosenthal financial sleuths: The Pops is plunking down $20,000 a year for the health insurances of Lappin’s fiancee and his maids.

Also, pops staffers have improperly factored in Lappin’s salary in the books, making it look like he took no pay when, indeed, he’s compensated handsomely. And Lappin is reimbursed for his use of a private jet he co-owns and limo rides, even when it’s unclear whether he is on Pops business or pleasure!

What’s more, the scathing report spells out how the group’s bylaws make Lappin, who’s also the Pops’ CEO and a board member, the sole person in the organization who gets to select, elect and reject members of the Pops board of directors. The board, which includes Lappin’s personal friends and business associates, then approves the conductor’s pay package — about half a million per season!

The forensic report caused such a ruckus that eight board members have resigned over the past month. Only six board members remain, just weeks before the new season’s opening concert.

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Red light cameras on Okeechobee Boulevard

The West Palm Beach Police Department is throwing professional courtesy into the wind.

Patrolmen have been told Friday they’ll have to pay the city’s $125-fines if they’re caught running red-lights equipped with cameras — even while in uniform and in a squad car.

And the same goes for any other law enforcement agency circulating on the city’s territory — unless, of course, there’s a legitimate emergency!

Tired of lawmen trying to weasel out of paying, Assistant Chief Dennis Crispo last week sent a preachy letter to all other area chiefs and  Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw to lay down the law.

“Please advise your members if they are captured on camera in their vehicles running the red light at these intersections, they will be cited,” the letter reads. “The only remedy for relief will be through the traffic court system. All law enforcement personnel must understand the high standard of conduct is applied to them in order for the public to have confidence in their departments and the officers.

“This trust is a critical and precious commodity . . . and yet it is fragile and easily lost.”

For more, and the poll and the locations of WPB’s cameras, look below or click (Read more…)

Ramos (Lannis Waters/The Palm Beach Post)

Suicide victim Brett Hall, the well-liked accountant who jumped to his death from the 21st floor of a downtown West Palm Beach office building Aug. 19, is believed to have downloaded dozens of pornographic videos, some showing prepubescent boys with adult males, according to police reports obtained by Page2Live.

Had he lived, he could have been charged with felony computer child exploitation and sexual performance by a child, and faced more than 20 years in prison.

Hall’s home in Boca Raton was being tossed by online pedophile-hunter Charlie Ramos, a Boynton Beach Police detective at the time Hall committed suicide. He jumped from the “Darth Vader” building, which ironically is located in the shadow of the county courthouse and the office of the State Attorney.

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Hall

The young man who jumped to his death from the 21st floor of a downtown West Palm Beach office building last week was under investigation by a sex crimes police task force, authorities and his employer told Page2Live.

Brett Hall, 24, who was buried today in Valhalla, N.Y., was questioned by members of the Palm Beach County Sexual Predator Enforcement Task Force about two hours before he committed suicide Thursday.

The secretive Boca-based unit is made of detectives with the State Attorney’s Office, Boca Raton and Boynton Beach police as well as the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

Through advanced data-mining techniques, the group investigates mainly child porn distributed through the Web.

A spokeswoman with the Boca Raton Resort, where Hall worked as an accountant, said detectives served a search warrant at Hall’s workstation about 9 a.m. Carole Boucard, the resort’s director of public relations, added she didn’t know what the investigators were looking for. But a source close to the probe told me they mainly searched Hall’s work computer.

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Lional Dalton (Click on the photo for his booking mug, and more)

Former National Football League journeyman Lional Dalton spent today in a West Palm Beach jail after surrendering to Palm Beach County authorities on charges of domestic violence.

The 350-pound defensive tackle, who made Boca Raton his home when he retired in 2006 after playing for the Baltimore Ravens, Denver Broncos, Kansas City Chiefs and Houston Texans, was scheduled to post his $2,000-bail today.

The wife, 5-foot Kimberly Dalton, also was arrested last week in connection with the same incident, which occurred at their home in March.

According to court records, the Daltons have been going at it for more than a year. He filed for divorce earlier this year.

Each has asked courts to grant several domestic violence injunctions against the other. Yet, they still share a $1 million-house at the fancy Fox Hill Estates, even if a judge ordered Lional to live in the pool house. He is only allowed in the main house, where Kimberly lives, to prepare food and attend to personal needs.

Still, they run into each other every so often — and that’s not good.

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Loeb and Vergara in Los Angeles last year (Courtesy People en Espanol)

Former State Senate candidate Nick Loeb was in critical condition today at a Los Angeles area hospital after a single-car crash in the swanky Bel-Air neighborhood.

Loeb, 35, who also ran unsuccessfully for Delray Beach City Commission, is mostly known in Tinseltown for the company he keeps. He has been romantically linked to sitcom star Sofia Vergara, who lives near the crash site.

The West Coast website TMZ reports this morning that paramedics found the trust-funder Loeb suffered a severely broken leg and a “deep gash” to his chest in the crash, which occurred on a narrow, winding road running through hilly Bel-Air.

While Vergara stars in the ABC hit series Modern Family, Loeb has been dabbling in movie production. He is the son of Ronald Reagan White House ambassador John Loeb and a cousin of former Seagram boss Edgar Bronfman.

Loeb was recently divorced from his Swedish wife Anna, who was arrested for DUI in Delray shortly after Loeb announced his candidacy for Sen. Jeff Atwater’s seat last year. Loeb quit the race a month later and took up with Vergara.

– Nick Loeb never had to scrounge for a hot date. Click here for racy photos of his conquests

Horn

There’s one job that U. S. Congress candidate Jim Horn, a self-described traditional values Democrat, forgot to add to his extensive resume as restaurateur, boat-racer and body-building products salesman.

But it’s something that many lovesick people in the Boca Raton area do remember!

Horn, 56, once worked as the vice president of Soulmates by Helena, a dating service whose owner pleaded no contest to two dozen charges of grand theft in 2004. She was ordered to pay back $300,000 in restitution to 41 former clients.

Matchmaker Helena Amram was also banned from operating her business in Palm Beach County while serving a five-year probation.

She was accused of fixing some of her rich clients — who paid up to $100,000 for a mate — with poor or sick or disabled dates. Some of the clients, meanwhile, included men with herpes and criminal records.

What about Horn, who’s seeking a seat once held by Mark Foley and Tim Mahoney?

At first Horn, who has moved to Palm City, told me he was never an employee of the company and never received a paycheck from Soulmates.

But when I reminded him of his testimony in an unrelated bankruptcy, in which he stated under oath that he was indeed a Soulmates employee and its vice president, he changed his tune.

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Got to give it to Delray Beach developer and philanthropist Frank McKinney: He sure knows how to keep the fires of love burning!

When McKinney proposed to interior decorator Nilsa 21 years ago, it made news throughout the state.

Clad in a camouflage outfit one night, he climbed a water tower in Boca Raton and hung a banner asking Nilsa to marry him.

He had neighborhood residents shine lights on the tower so she could see.

Nilsa said yes.

Still does.

McKinney, a builder of beachside properties in SoFla and homes for the poor in Haiti, surprised Nilsa by handing her the old wedding gown Tuesday afternoon then whisked her away to St. Vincent Ferrer Church to renew their vows.

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