Weather Report #24: A terrific and action-packed science fiction trilogy, a disturbing film about the dark web, and more...

Hello friends and enemies. One day I will learn that I have to write these posts throughout the week then add the finishing touches on Saturday, so that they can go up early on Sunday. But today is not that day, which is why this is hitting your inbox on Monday.

Welcome to your Weather Report, a weekly column where I recommend a book, a movie, some music, and maybe even a video game, as well as some possibly underlooked articles for you to read.

Here's what you're getting this week:

1. I wrote an article about what the firing of five out of the seven members of Puerto Rico's fiscal control board could mean for the ongoing bankruptcy of our state energy agency. Spoiler: it's probably not great!
2. A little scoop for y'all about the government dropping the charges against a CPA indicted for wire fraud relating to an alleged Act 20 and Act 22 scheme.
3. One of the most fun and action-packed sci-fi trilogies I have read in a really long time.
4. Essays, articles, and columns about: apocalypse all the time, Substack's Nazi bar problem, and scam text jobs.
5. A terrifying film about the darkest corners of the internet and the people who inhabit them.
6. Continuing last week's LATAM indie music wave with three more great songs

If you're interested in seeing the recommendations – and supporting Heavy Weather's quest to keep tabs on collapse – you can become a paid subscriber by clicking the button below. Paid subscribers get access to the MEDIA LIST, a comprehensive list of every book, movie, and video game I've ever recommended. If you're already a paid subscriber, thank you very much! This newsletter would literally not be possible without your support.

What I Did This Week:

On Monday of this week, Breitbart (ew) broke the news that Trump dismissed five of the seven members of the Financial Oversight and Management Board of Puerto Rico (FOMB), an unelected fiscal control board that has essentially controlled everything about the archipelago since 2016. The move, much like the FOMB itself, is an exercise in sweeping authoritarian colonial power. The president can mostly do as he pleases with the board in the same way the board has mostly done whatever they wanted with Puerto Rico.

However, questions remain about what this will mean for Puerto Rico and the ongoing bankruptcy of Puerto Rico's energy agency. My article attempts to answer some of those questions. And the conclusion from the multiple experts I spoke with seems to be that the new members will probably move towards a position that favors vulture funds instead of Puerto Ricans. However, it's unclear if they will actually be able to succeed.

You can read the article here: https://thelatinonewsletter.org/p/trump-fiscal-control-board-firings-mean-for-puerto-rico

A couple hours after this article went live, the judge overseeing the bankruptcy case put it all deadlines on pause for the foreseeable future.

Updates:

Government Reaches Agreement with CPA Indicted for Wire Fraud. Will Drop Pending Charges in a Year

Here's a tiny scoop that I might eventually turn into a longer article.

Gabriel F. Hernández, a CPA that worked for BDO Puerto Rico who was indicted for wire fraud, has reportedly reached an agreement with the United States government and will have his pending charges dropped in a year, according to a motion reviewed by Heavy Weather.

The agreement reportedly reached between Hernández and the government is not part of the filing.

Hernández was originally indicted in 2020 on ten charges of wire fraud for allegedly filing fraudulent tax-exemption decree applications with state and federal agencies, then engaging in "sham transactions" to create the "illusion of a consulting business earning income from services performed within Puerto Rico, rather than within mainland United States," reads the indictment. The case had been dormant for about two years before it was restarted earlier this year.

I'm going to refrain from publicly speculating about what the agreement includes or why the government decided to drop the charges, but this seems really weird, man. In my experience, it's fairly rare for the Department of Justice to drop charges like this, which makes me extremely curious as to what the terms of the agreement could be.

You can find the informative motion here: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/18561953/86/united-states-v-hernandez/

That's it for this week's free stuff. If you want to see the media recommendations and the link roundup, you can become a paid subscriber today.