Vanilla Ice, and a contractor on the house he is rebuilding in Welly for a TV show (Click on the photo for more)

Vanilla Ice promised back in May that he’d do what he called a “kick ass” stunt to make the reality TV show he’s finishing a little more exciting.

He delivered.

Ice, who lives in the Versailles community in Wellington, drove a ‘67 Cadillac up a short ramp, through a ring of fire and into a pond. It all happened last week on land Ice, aka Rob Van Winkle, owns in the north part of Palm Beach County.

Check it out:

The 42-year-old singer of Ice Ice Baby has been working on a TV show all summer in which he attempts to flip a distressed property down the street from his in Versailles.

When the entertainer bought the place in foreclosure earlier this year, vandals stole wall fixtures, garden and pool equipment, tiles, pavers and the appliances. So Ice and his crew have been pimping the crib up, hoping to sell it for at least three times the $420,000 he paid for it.

Ice told Page2Live when I toured the house in May that he’d add pranks and stunts to turn up the entertainment value of the program.

As for the Caddy stunt, in case you’re wondering, no one got hurt. The rapper-turned-builder emerged from the sinking car while pumping his fists in the air. He then disappeared underwater as his entourage wondered if he was drowning.

He did eventually come up for air.

– Click here for the original story about the show

– Click here for a bird’s eye view of Vanilla Ice’s home, and the house he is rebuilding on the exclusive Page2Live map of celebrities

Michaels (middle) with Jimmy Fallon and Tina Fey (Click on the photo for more on this and other celebs' homes)

Celeb arrival in Wellington!

Saturday Night Live creator and executive producer Lorne Michaels plunked down $667,500 for a rather modest 2,100-square-foot, three-bed, three-bath pied-a-terre in South Florida’s horse capital.

The Canadian-born Michaels, 65, his wife and 12-year-old daughter Sophie have been winter regulars here for the last few years as Sophie learns show jumping. They used to stay with singer Jimmy Buffett in Palm Beach then, last season, rented the Equestrian Club Estates house that’s been theirs since July 6.

I’m told Michaels plans on spending 200K on freshening the property. The missus, Alice, wants a lap pool, gourmet kitchen and a glamor bathroom.

Michaels’ is six doors down from actress Glenn Close (Fatal Attraction, TV’s The Shield) on Calypso Lane. Elsewhere in the gated community are the horse-season homes of rocker Bruce Springsteen and New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg.

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Goodman attended a polo function in 2009 with Lizzie McGuire actress Hillary Duff (Click on the photo for more)

Wellington polo boss and DUI killing suspect John Goodman is receiving alcoholism and drug-addiction counseling three times a week from the shrink who helped Conservative radio talker Rush Limbaugh in his battle against pain pills, Page2Live has learned.

According to papers filed in multi-millionaire trust-funder Goodman’s criminal case at the Palm Beach County courthouse, the 46-year-old founder of the International Polo Club Palm Beach is banned from traveling out of the county without special permission. He’s out on $100,000-bond as he awaits trial.

Goodman has, however, blanket permission to travel to the North Miami office of clinical psychologist Steven Strumwasser.

Citing privacy laws Strumwasser, the former director of residential treatment for a Miami-Hollywood’s Spectrum Programs, said he couldn’t comment. But in the world of chemical dependency and depression, he is somewhat of a rock star.

Strumwasser is also used as expert witness in SoFla trials in which drugs are at issue, often to explain how addiction can affect a suspect’s behavior.

And then, there was the great Limbaugh Viagra caper!

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British Royal Prince Harry of Wales poses for pictures with Wellington superstar polo player, and Ralph Lauren model, Nacho Figueras Sunday afternoon, after the Veuve Clicquot Polo Classic on Governors Island in New York City. And the reason the 25-year-old Harry, the son of Prince Charles and Princess Diana, isn’t looking too happy is because he took a spectacular tumble during the match. Or is it because the English national team was spanked by Germany at the world cup soccer earlier in the day? Or maybe, just because he’s a Brit?

Straub

Prominent Wellington landowner and developer Glenn Straub has been indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of unlawful discharge in a body of water.

Moneybags Straub, 63, is facing a maximum of $1 million in fines and six years in prison if convicted of the two violations of the Clean Water Act. The indictment names both Straub and his Palm Beach Polo Holdings.

Straub’s lawyer, Craig Galle, did not return calls for comments.

The investigation centered on Straub’s work in 20o5 on land he owned near the Palm Beach International Equestrian Center. Straub sold the property to Equestrian Sport Productions owner Mark Bellissimo six months after he allegedly allowed discharges of fill and pollutants into wetlands known as Peacock Pond.

There were indications as early as 2007 that Straub was under investigation. That year, the Miami-based grand jury subpoenaed paperwork from several companies that cleared the property from melaleuca and Brazilian pepper trees.

A polo buff, Straub is best known in the village as the owner/developer of the fancy Palm Beach Polo Golf & Country Club. He is also known as a lawsuit-happy businessman who pulls no punches when it comes to acquiring, or selling, land. Several environmental issues, including Straub’s desire to develop pristine woods and his allowing one small forest to dry out, have caused the ire of some country club homeowners during Straub’s 20-year tenure there.

A few years ago, a crowd cheered when Straub fell off a polo pony, and had to be airlifted to a hospital.

Straub has denied dumping landfill into the pond, and denied the area should be deemed wetlands.

Goodman with actress Hillary Duff at a polo function last year (Click on the photo for more)

Wellington polo boss John Goodman, the man accused of  killing a 23-year-old engineering graduate in a DUI accident in February, was deemed unqualified to run a family trust-fund by his brother.

In court documents the brother, Greg Goodman, also noted John “never finished college and pursues no serious profession.”

In other words, there’s a good chance you won’t see Greg on the witness list if this killing goes to trial!

The Broward-Palm Beach New Times dug out a decade-old lawsuit stemming from a feud within Goodman’s family that forced John to relinquish control of the trust-fund.

Goodman was charged with DUI manslaughter and vehicular homicide for his role in the death of Scott Wilson in rural Wellington. Investigators believe Goodman was drunk when he went through a stop sign in the wee hours of the morning, driving his Bentley into Wilson’s Hyndai.

Over the years, meanwhile, his own family didn’t seem to think much of John.

John, his brother Greg and two sisters  are the children of a deceased Texas air-conditioning tycoon Harold Goodman. When he died, Harold left a series of trust-funds. One, for Greg’s four children, was supposed to be administered by polo patron John. So, Greg sued to wrestle control of the fund in 1998, saying then that John was not qualified for the job.

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Manuel Bornia (Richard Graulich/The Palm Beach Post)

Remember Manuel Bornia?

He was the young man (now 28) entrusted in 2005 with the unlikely job of building an arts campus on an empty lot in the fancy West Palm Beach suburb of Wellington.

Bornia’s habit then was to over-promise: The concert hall on the campus was to rival West Palm’s Kravis. And he routinely under-delivered: The 10-acre lot earmarked for the arts campus is still empty.

In time Bornia’s group, the Cultural Trust of the Palm Beaches, was unable to raise enough cash and filed for bankruptcy — this, in a town stuffed with multi-millionaire artists like rocker Bruce Springsteen and Men In Black’s Tommy Lee Jones. Bornia was forced to resign amid accusations he overspent and twisted the truth.

Fast forward to now. Somehow, Bornia’s the head of Daytona Beach’s Community Cultural Foundation. He recently calls a press conference to announce a three-day beachside music festival with: Janet Jackson, Christina Aguilera, Usher, the Jonas Brothers, Rihanna, Carrie Underwood, Justin Bieber, among others.

The city agrees to invest $125,000 to promote, and the beach’s about to go from sleepy to star-struck.

Sounds great, right?

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Richter (The Palm Beach Post)

Capt. Greg Richter, the subject of an Internal Affairs probe into his behavior toward an ex-mistress, quickly retired from the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office today.

District Commander Richter was the highest-ranking law enforcement officer in Wellington, which contracts with PBSO for its public safety.

“The captain’s retirement is effective this morning,” said PBSO spokeswoman Teri Barbera. “The I.A. investigation has been closed. With him gone, we couldn’t discipline him anyway.”

The 18-year PBSO veteran’s move came on the day after a Page2Live story revealed the 53-year-old was under scrutiny.

The probe started last week after a graphic letter — written on PBSO letterhead and allegedly sent by Richter to the ex-mistress — and an exchange of e-mails between the two was anonymously forwarded to Sheriff Ric Bradshaw and Wellington Mayor Darell Bowen.

The letter, according to the woman to whom it was addressed, was an angry rant from Richter a month after they broke up. Richter, by the way, is married and has four children. He also teaches a highly sought after class on deviant behavior at Florida Atlantic University in Port St. Lucie.

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Richter, talking to Wellington residents in 2007 (The Palm Beach Post)

Capt. Greg Richter, the commander of the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office district in Wellington, has been placed on administrative leave pending an Internal Affairs investigation into allegations of on-duty sex with a mistress, according to several sheriff’s office and government insiders.

Richter, 53, the married dad of four children, told Page2Live he has no idea why I.A. is checking him out.

But the buzz at the sheriff’s headquarters is that Richter’s work computer is being searched for graphic email exchanges with the woman, a Wellington realtor who’s much younger.

“Anyone in this country can make a weird complaint against someone else,” said Richter, Wellington’s highest law enforcement official. The village contracts with PBSO for its public safety. “The sooner I.A. takes a look into this, the better everyone will be.”

The agency’s brass, which just had to deal with the retirement of a female lieutenant who had sex with subordinates, is mum. PBSO Spokeswoman Teri Barbera only confirmed that the captain, who also teaches criminal justice at Florida Atlantic University’s Port St. Lucie campus,  is under investigation.

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The attorneys defending Wellington polo mogul John Goodman in a vehicular homicide case that could land him in jail for 30 years contributed several thousand dollars to the campaign of State Attorney Mike McAuliffe.

McAuliffe’s the man whose job it is to put Goodman behind bars.

Perp walk: John Goodman (middle) is released on bond Wednesday. He's flanked with attorneys Guy Fronstin (left) and Mark Shapiro (right) (Click on the photo for more)

According to state campaign records, Goodman’s star defender, Miami lawyer Roy Black, made two maximum yearly contributions of $500 in 2007 and 2008, the year McAuliffe was elected, as did Black’s law partner Scott Kornspan.

Boca’s Guy Fronstin, the local pointman on Black’s defense team, and members of his family contributed a total of $2,500 toward McAuliffe’s election. Fronstin’s in kind contributions included food and drinks for McAuliffe’s fundraisers.

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