UPDATE: Man Who Shook 'Herald' in Miami With 'Gun' Now in Custody

By: E&P Staff and The Associated Press An editorial cartoonist for the Miami Herald's sister newspaper, El Nuevo Herald, Jose Varela, who took over a floor of the Herald building and was armed -- with what turned out to be a toy gun -- was taken into custody, police announced around 2:30 this afternoon.

Employees on that floor had been evacuated and a SWAT team soon arrived. The gunman surrendered peacefully and no shots were fired.

Varela is featured prominently on the El Nuevo Herald home page every day, with a photo/illustration of him and a list of his latest daily cartoons. He was recently divorced. It is also known that he has been upset over the current conflicts surrounding the case of El Nuevo Herald staffers accepting money for their work with Radio Marti -- and how the newspaper handled that controversy.

Police had quickly set up a perimeter around the downtown building. A police spokesman at a 2:00 PM news conference said they were trying to learn the "mindset" of the gunman, who earlier outlined grievances, including pay, with the papers. He said employees who remained in the building were not in danger.

Tom Fiedler, executive editor of the Miami Herald, told FoxNews at 1:45 PM ET, that the man was still holed up in the office of the editor of El Nuevo Herald and claiming control of the newsroom. All staffers there had been evacuated. Varela said he had many grievances and promised to "tell the truth," Fielder said.

Fiedler was speaking from his fifth floor office, just below where the gunman was holed up. He said there was no danger to others as they had been evacuated and the man was sealed off. The man was making phone calls but not backing down at that point, Fiedler said. He said he did not exactly "storm" the office and employees had a chance to exit. Fielder refused to say what the man's grievances might be, adding that he was certainly "not acting rationally."

The Miami Herald noted today: "Tensions have flared in recent weeks between the two newsrooms and between some members of the Cuban American community and the Miami Herald, but it was unclear if those issues played a role in Friday's event.

"While barricaded in the office, Varela twice telephoned Miami attorney Joe Garcia, who had represented him in a condominium dispute several months ago. Garcia said that Varela declared his intention to take control of the newspaper. Garcia said Varela told him in Spanish that, 'Now they're going to have to deal with the truth.'''

It was the second situation involving a gun at the newspaper in the past year and half. In July 2005, former city commissioner Arthur E. Teele Jr. fatally shot himself in the Herald lobby after asking to speak with columnist Jim DeFede. Teele had been under investigation for corruption and was just indicted by a federal grand jury on fraud charges.

El Nuevo reporter Rui Ferreira said Varela had been in the newsroom a week ago and told former colleagues he had bought sawed-off shotgun and an Uzi submachine gun because he felt unsafe in Jupiter, where he moved recently. Ferreira wrote in a blog that he had spoken to the gunman, who told him, "You are speaking to the new director of the newspaper and I am going to unmask all of the true conflicts in the newspaper."

Varela called the paper a "pigsty", said it made fun of the Cuban exile community in Miami and that the paper paid poorly.

"They've been making fun of people long enough and today they will see it end in violence. But someone has to pay and that person is going to be (Humberto) Castello." he said, referring to the Spanish-language paper's executive editor -- whose office he would occupy before police got him out.

Varela's work is featured in the book, "Cuban Miami."

This is his biography, from the El Nuevo Herald site.

*

I was born in Cuba, in the country -- which means any place that is not Havana -- more than 40 years ago but it kills me that I do not remember the exact date because I suffer from amnesia due to stress from credit cards.

I remember that I was always a bad student because I spent my time drawing caricatures of the teacher; before long they expelled me from the halls. Since I was not a chief, nor musician, nor a dancer, nor a ballplayer, nor a dissident with projects, I could not leave the country -- so I left on the first boat I could find. That was through Mariel to Key West.

I arrived in Miami and this was a swamp full of crocodiles but later it was dried up. They put up freeways, bridges and cafeterias to sell little Mor?n cakes and maracuy? juice. Later, a weekly newspaper got the idea (because they were missing the crossword puzzle) to publish my cartoons and later they began to give me prizes.

I really would have liked to enter NASA and become an astronaut, but dreams remain dreams. And in reality, the Man Upstairs gives and takes away. So he gave me a wife who never ages, a daughter who draws better than I can and a stout boy who, if he were to give me a karate chop with his hand, it would send me to the hospital.

What more can I ask of life? What's more, I've enjoyed Fidel's fall: tumbling on the floor, not me but Castro.

I'm a happy man. Even though I cry if I see a movie like Titanic. Because I don't like sinkings.