NO BONUS POINTS?:

U.S. Judge Delays Return of 3 of Cuban Buick Rafters (Frances Kerry, 2/06/04, Reuters)

A U.S. federal judge ordered on Friday that three of a group of 11 Cubans who tried to sail to Florida in a boat made from an old Buick car not be sent home at least until Monday afternoon.

U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno was responding to a motion filed in court by a Cuban American exile group seeking an injunction to stop the group from being repatriated.

The Cubans are currently being held on a Coast Guard cutter at sea after being stopped by the U.S. Coast Guard in the Florida Straits on Tuesday as they tried to make the 90-mile crossing from the communist island to Florida in their green 1959 Buick remodeled as a boat.

Moreno's order applied only to a family of three -- Luis Grass, his wife and son -- and not to the other eight on board the Buick. In theory, that means those eight could be repatriated at any time. [...]

Images of the group motoring through the water in their stately, green Buick, first shown on local television stations, captured the imagination of Miami's large Cuban American community, not least because four of the 11 people on board had tried a similar voyage on a modified 1951 Chevy truck last July, only to be picked up and sent home.

They should all get to stay anyway, but in particular they should be rewarded for creativity.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 6, 2004 9:23 PM