Leer en espa\u00f1ol<\/a><\/p>\nJose R. Arana, who has addresses in Miami\u2019s Coral Gate neighborhood and just outside of Allapattah, is accused of taking money and, in one case, not finishing a job, and in another, not even starting work.<\/p>\n
Police said in May 2024, Arana \u2015 operating \u201cExclusive Works Group\u201d \u2015 provided a $241,600 estimate to remodel a victim\u2019s home on Los Pinos Boulevard and asked for $15,000 up front. According to an arrest report, he \u201cnever returned to (the) home or conducted any work.\u201d<\/p>\n
Authorities said Arana instead asked for more money, which the victim didn\u2019t give to him.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, police said that November, a resident on Alcazar Avenue hired Arana to perform a home renovation, paying him more than $200,000. According to an arrest report, a laundry list of tasks had yet to be completed as of Monday, including electrical, paint and plumbing work.<\/p>\n
Considering all the work that wasn\u2019t finished, police said the victim estimated that Arana left him out about $100,000, all told.<\/p>\n
Authorities said Miami police took Arana into custody after he tried to use a fake identification to get a player\u2019s club card at the Magic City Casino at 450 NW 37th Ave. on Sunday evening.<\/p>\n
The Nicaraguan national was arrested on a charge of using a stolen or forged identification card as an unauthorized alien and taken to the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center.<\/p>\n
Coral Gables police were made aware of his arrest and went to TGK on Monday to formally arrest him on additional charges: two each of grand theft, organized scheme to defraud and contracting without a license.<\/p>\n
As of Tuesday, Arana remained at TGK on a $13,500 bond and an Immigration and Customs Enforcement hold.<\/p>\n
\ud83c\udfe0 News From Your Neighborhood<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by WPLG Local10.com – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CORAL GABLES, Fla. \u2014 Coral Gables police say a 47-year-old unlicensed contractor ripped off two of the city\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":176499,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[8601,28,4324,225,227,226],"class_list":["post-176498","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-hialeah","tag-capitol","tag-florida","tag-florida-capitol","tag-hialeah","tag-hialeah-headlines","tag-hialeah-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176498","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176498"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176498\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/176499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}