Source: OIJOn Friday afternoon, agents from the Office of Judicial Investigations (Spanish initials: OIJ) arrested a 31-year old male expat who is alleged to have run a sexual extortion scheme against his lover. The suspect is from Panama and has been residing in Costa Rica for a few years. A couple of years ago, he met a 35-year old woman with whom he established a romantic and sexual relatio...

Source: MSPA disarmingly cute newborn jaguarundi, sometimes called an eyra cat, was rescued by officers from Fuerza Publica (the national police force of Costa Rica) on Friday afternoon. The rescue took place in Gamalotal, a rural district of Nicoya in the province of Guanacaste. According to an official press released issued by the Ministry of Public Security, the wild kitten was actually fo...

Villa Punto de VistaVilla Punto de Vista, a 10-bedroom luxury private villa situated on 2 1/2 acres of tropical reserve in Costa Rica, will be featured in the upcoming broadcast of Life's A Beach on Travel Channel. Life's A Beach focuses on real-life stories of people who left their workaday life to pursue their dream of owning a slice of heaven in a beach paradise. Viewers get an inside look at ...

Instagram photoAtsushi Yamanaka, a talented play-making midfielder from Japan, recently made professional football history in Costa Rica by signing with Club Sport Uruguay (CSU) of Coronado. Mr. Yamanaka is the first Japanese player to sign with a professional football club in Costa Rica. Previously, Mr. Yamanaka played at the pro level in the Dominican Republic, where he was signed with the S...

Source: Wikimedia CommonsTwo U.S. citizens and a Canadian citizen have pleaded guilty for their roles in a $9 million “sweepstakes fraud” scheme to defraud hundreds of U.S. residents, many of them elderly, announced Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Jill Westmoreland Rose of the Western District of North Carolina. Jeff...

Star goalkeeper Keylor Navas, who mostly resides in Spain by virtue of his contract with the stellar Real Madrid football club, recently explained during an interview that he feels less freedom in Costa Rica. Mr. Navas is currently on vacation in his native Costa Rica after recovering from a surgical procedure that was performed shortly after the Real Madrid obtained the UEFA Champions League t...

Villa ParaisoWhen captain of industry Mickey Novak decided to sell his business and build his dream vacation home, he approached the project with his signature brand of intense focus. “We knew the kind of life we wanted” Novak explains. “The bigger question was, where did that lifestyle exist.” Having globe-trotted through 86 countries and after eschewing Hawaii, passing on several Caribbean ...

Source: Gun N' Roses Legendary rock band Guns N' Roses has officially announced its Latin American reunion tour, and the band's website lists Costa Rica as its final stop. Guns N' Roses fans from Costa Rica were excited to find the Chinese-donated National Stadium, located in La Sabana Metropolitan Park, listed for a concert appearance on November 26th, following a few dates in Brazil. I...

Sharemoney.com Sharemoney, Omnex Group's online money transfer service, is expanding services to include money transfers to Costa Rica. Sharemoney has been facilitating money transfers from the United States to countries all over the world for more than 25 years, and this expansion continues the goal of making it easier to send money worldwide.  Sharemoney's mission is to aid people who live i...

Source: LigaPokemonCR Facebook Although the Pokemon GO mobile app has not been formally released in Costa Rica, gamers are finding way to install the new game on their iPhones and Android-powered devices. Pokemon GO is an augmented reality game that requires mobile devices equipped with Internet connectivity, camera, GPS, and Bluetooth. The game is the latest iteration of an entertainment e...

William Albert Ulmer, aka “Bill Ulmer,” 49, of West Dickinson, North Dakota, was sentenced today to three years in prison for traveling with a stolen passport and aggravated identity theft charges, announced Jill Westmoreland Rose, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. U.S. District Judge Robert J. Conrad, Jr. also sentenced Ulmer to three years of supervised release after he i...

Waning economic growth in many countries and higher home prices further enhanced by a strengthening United States dollar resulted in a slight decline in international sales dollar volume of U.S. property over the past year and a significant retreat in buying from non-resident foreigners. This is according to an annual survey of residential purchases from international buyers released today by t...

Source: Melissa Mora Facebook Whenever an attractive woman who happens to be in the media spotlight offers a glimpse at her nipples in Costa Rica, a social media ruckus is bound to follow. The nipple of contention this time around happens to belong to Melissa Mora, a very sexy and popular glamour model who has also ventured into singing and appearing on reality television shows. For vari...

By Wendy Anders Every year in July, the National Census Institute (INEC) sends surveyors to a sample of homes throughout Costa Rica to provide updated demographic and economic data to policy makers. Starting today, the survey, known in Spanish as La Encuesta de Hogares, aims to reach an estimated 13,5000 homes with questions on income, poverty, equality, access to good and services, land use...

Source: Fuerza Publica A sex offender from the United States is on the lam again after being extradited from Costa Rica. John Wesley Saatio, a fugitive facing several criminal charges in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, escaped from a van transporting prisoners in Florida on Saturday night. According to a news broadcast by WEAR, an ABC affiliate television station in Pensacola, Mr. Saatio h...

Source; UNHCR On 6 and 7 July 2016, the Organization of American States and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, will convene in San José, Costa Rica, a high-level roundtable meeting on refugees and displaced people from the Northern Triangle of Central America and the urgent need to find solutions to this growing protection situation. The two-day event in San José, the first international meeting...

Source: USTDA San José, Costa Rica – Today, the U.S. Trade and Development Agency awarded a grant to Costa Rican electric utility, Compañía Nacional de Fuerza y Luz, S.A. (CNFL), for a feasibility study to support the deployment of networked light emitting diode (LED) street lights throughout CNFL’s service territory. By installing nearly 100,000 “smart” street lights, including LED luminar...

By Wendy Anders Cleaning out your closets might provide you with some trade opportunities; bartering, human’s oldest form of economic transaction has gone digital. A new App, available for both iOS and Android, facilitates bartering in Costa Rica. Over the past four months the platform has aided close to 6,000 transactions. “Su Canje” currently has some 7,000 App users and over 22,000 lik...

Source: Heineken Despite volatile global markets and growing security issues, organizations continue to leverage global expansion strategies to remain competitive and to grow. Yet, few organizations are prepared for the challenges world events have on their business, including the impact on cost of expatriate packages. Mercer’s 22nd annual Cost of Living Survey finds that factors including ...

Illustrative image. (Flickr Commons) A young man who came to Costa Rica to help foreign language students at institutions of higher learning is currently recovering from multiple stab wounds sustained after a violent robbery. According to a recent news report filed by Yaslin Cabezas of online news daily Costa Rica Hoy, the man is of French nationality and has been solely identified by the l...

Pixabay Commons Of all immigration proceedings available to foreigners in Costa Rica, the process of getting a work permit for employees is one of the most Byzantine. What makes getting work permits in Costa Rica so complicated is that more than one government agency is involved in the process. The Directorate of Immigration and the Ministry of Labor must review the applications before they...

Agents from the Office of Judicial Investigations (Spanish initials: OIJ) arrested a 30-year old man for allegedly attempting to sexually extort her on social media in Costa Rica. According to a recent news report filed by Allan Chacon Soto of daily tabloid Diario Extra, the arrest took place at a public park in Hatillo, a series of populous districts located just south of the capital city of C...

Wikimedia Commons Commuters stuck in traffic during Friday morning in the eastern districts of San Jose were surprised to see a naked man calmly walking down the street and occasionally attempting to direct the flow of traffic. The incident occurred in San Pedro, precisely at the traffic circle that surrounds the Hispanic Heritage Fountain. According to a television report broadcast by nati...

American Staffordshire Terriers, or pit bulls, are becoming more popular in Costa Rica, rising from 9th place in 2011 to 4th place in World Animal Protection’s recent survey on dog ownership. Staffords, along with poodles, schnauzers and others, still only represent a small portion of Costa Rica’s estimated 1.3 million dogs, with mutts or “zaguates” making up nearly half. “We were surprised ...

Wikimedia Commons Today, Sanofi Pasteur, Sanofi's vaccine division, announced that the National Ministry of Public Health of Costa Rica has approved Sanofi Pasteur's tetravalent dengue vaccine, Dengvaxia®, to protect individuals 9 to 45 years of age living in endemic areas against all four serotypes of dengue. This approval in Costa Rica is the fourth registration of the dengue vaccine in L...

The Reality of Truth Mike Zapolin, best known as “Zappy”, recently won “best director award” for his documentary film The Reality Of Truth”. The acclaimed documentary features the beautiful Michelle Rodriguez of the Fast and Furious film franchise, Deepak Chopra, Joel Osteen, Dr. Drew, Ram Dass, Marianne Williamson, Foster Gamble, and many more. Zappy and his unique group of friends make a pas...

(Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica) - The Sloth Institute (TSI), located in Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica announces its collaboration with Toucan Rescue Ranch (TRR) to begin a Sloth Release and Education Program at TRR to enhance its Sloth Release and Education Program. TRR’s release site is located in Sarapiqui, Costa Rica, which is one-hour from their rescue center. This release site has 40 acres of rainf...

Flickr Commons STOCKHOLM--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Millicom, the telecommunications and media company dedicated to emerging markets in Latin America and Africa, today announced a strategic partnership with Netflix, the world’s leading Internet television network, that will bring Netflix app preloads to Android smartphones from TigoSmart and provide promotions to TigoStar and TigoSmart customers in Lat...

Bull shark. Wikimedia Commons MIAMI, June 15, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The most 'fintastic' time of the year is back and making a huge splash! LA SEMANA DEL TIBURÓN (#semanadeltiburon) returns in its 28th anniversary and will keep viewers on the edge of their seat with all-new jaw-dropping and compelling stories about everyone's favorite marine predator. Featuring new research from Mexico, Florida...

ALPHARETTA, Ga., June 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- It only took six weeks for the nearly 200 team members of the Scheduling Institute to hit their goal of $20,000 to support an immediate need for the Soup Kitchen in La Carpio, Costa Rica, a far cry from the affluent town of Alpharetta, where the company's headquarters are located. La Carpio is one of the poorest and most dangerous communities in Costa ...

Taza Agua COSTA RICA (PRWEB) JUNE 15, 2016 - Taza Agua, the world’s first to market bottled water company designed specifically for America’s $18 billion dollar annual coffee market, has confirmed today that it has been officially endorsed by an international multi-award winning certified coffee judge, Kattia Barrantes Zuñiga. The stamp of approval from the world recognized coffee expert is a m...

Source: Christie CYPRESS, CA (PRWEB) JUNE 15, 2016 - Christie®, a leader in creating and delivering the world’s best visual and audio experiences, is proud to announce that its Christie Duo® projection system was installed in Nova ONE, Costa Rica’s biggest film screen. Nova ONE is the main screen at the Nova Cinemas multiplex the newly opened Plaza Real Alajuela shopping mall, not far from San...

Source: BlackBerry On June 1st, Canadian tech giant BlackBerry launched a beta period of video calling through its BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) platform in Costa Rica and across 26 countries in Latin America. According to an official blog post published by BlackBerry, video calling is almost ready for primetime; it was launched as a beta feature for Android and iOS, as part of the latest vers...

US Embassy in Costa Rica The United States Diplomatic Mission in San Jose is seeking eligible and qualified applicants for the position of Security Escort. This position is open only to United States citizens living in Costa Rica. The position is temporary and will not exceed one year from hire date. All applicants must have the required work and/or residency permits to be eligible for c...

BALTIMORE, MD (PRWEB) JUNE 13, 2016 - For decades, Costa Rica has been among the world’s premier retirement destinations. It’s a country that is nearly carbon neutral, sustainably producing most of its power without increasing greenhouse gasses. It’s a country with no standing army. It’s a country whose people consistently rank among the Costa Rica is Once Again the Happiest Nation According to N...

Permacube Costa Rica San Isidro, Costa Rica - PermaCube Revolution is possibly the most practical solution to address the world’s food and water needs. Jim Gale, an eco community developer in Costa Rica, and his team have created a truly revolutionary system that assists with self reliance and abundance. The Permacube Revolution is open source so you can build it yourself, just sign up on ...

Source; Wikimedia Commons San Jose, Costa Rica (June 6, 2016) – New data from George Mason University has revealed that shark meat sold in San Jose and Heredia food markets contain high levels of toxic mercury. The levels are so high that three shark species tested exceed U.S. federal health guidelines. Advocates are advising consumers, and especially women and children, to not buy shark due t...

Pixabay Commons Over the last couple of decades, Tamarindo Beach has undergone an amazing transformation from sleepy beach town to a major real estate market and a haven for expats in Costa Rica. These days, Tamarindo Beach is known as one of the most attractive beach communities that make up Costa Rica’s Gold Coast, and a major reason for this distinction is that residents have easy access to...

Source: Green Lava Microsoft Xbox Media Release - On January 1st, 2013, a three-man team started a project named Project Phoenix. Little did they know, this project would be one of the longest journeys for the Costa Rican development team, Green Lava Studios. For our team, those 3 years, 5 months and 7 days were totally worth it, as our dream of bringing a video game on a major video game con...

Source: Cogsi, DeviantArt One of the many positive aspects of life in the Guanacaste region is the abundance of sporting and recreational activities available to residents and their guests. Here are some recommendations suggested by the real estate professionals of RE/MAX Ocean Surf & Sun, located in Tamarindo Beach. Soccer The national sport of Costa Rica is closely followed and...