National Desk
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

EAST
FAN DEATH PROMPTS PETITION TO BAN ‘LESS-LETHAL’ WEAPONS
BOSTON – Civil rights advocates angry over the death of a student hit by a pepper-spray pellet are seeking at least a temporary ban on the Boston Police Department’s use of so-called “less-lethal” weapons to control crowds.
The police commissioner last week created an independent commission to investigate the October 21 death of Victoria Snelgrove and review weapons like the one believed to have caused the 21-year-old’s death. Snelgrove was shot in the eye during a massive celebration outside Fenway Park after the Red Sox won the American League pennant. Critics who held a news conference yesterday said Boston police should stop using pepper-ball pellets, bean bag projectiles, and rubber bullets until they expand training, ensure accountability, and get the weapons independently tested. About 1,000 Boston residents so far have signed a petition that is to be presented to city officials on November 15, advocates said.
Police have said they used pepper-pellet guns the night Snelgrove was killed in hopes of preventing serious injury after people within the crowd began lighting fires and throwing bottles. In response to the petition drive, police Commissioner Kathleen O’Toole said in a statement yesterday that police “value their input and share many of their concerns.” She also noted that Boston police have halted at least temporarily their use of the style of compressed-air pellet gun fired at Snelgrove.
– Associated Press
AIR NATIONAL GUARD F-16 JET FIRES AT SCHOOL
LITTLE EGG HARBOR, N.J. – A National Guard fighter jet on a nighttime training mission Wednesday fired 25 rounds of ammunition that struck an elementary school. No one was injured.
The military is investigating the incident that damaged Little Egg Harbor Intermediate School shortly after 11 p.m. Police were called when a custodian, the only person in the school at the time, heard what sounded like someone running across the roof of the building. Police Chief Mark Siino yesterday said the school roof was punctured, ceiling tiles had fallen into classrooms, and there were scratch marks in the asphalt outside. The 2-inch long bullets are made of lead and do not explode, said Colonel Brian Webster, commander of the 177th Fighter Wing of the New Jersey Air National Guard. “We don’t know what happened that caused the gun to fire,” Colonel Webster said.
New Jersey public schools were closed yesterday because of a teachers convention. The Ocean County school is scheduled to reopen Monday.
The pilot was supposed to fire at a target on the ground 3 1/2 miles away from school on the Warren Grove firing range, Colonel Webster said. The plane was 7,000 feet in the air when the shots were fired. “The National Guard takes this situation very seriously,” said Lieutenant Colonel Roberta Niedt, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Military and Veterans Affairs. “The safety of our people and the surrounding communities are our foremost concern.”
– Associated Press
CASINO WORKERS RETURN TO JOBS AFTER STRIKE
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – Thousands of cocktail waitresses, housekeepers, bellhops, and other workers returned to their jobs yesterday, ending a month long strike that hit them in the pocketbook and cost this gambling town visitors.
At Bally’s Park Place, cocktail waitress Tressa Hughes jumped up and down and hugged co-workers on her return after the end of the strike by 10,000 service workers. They went on strike over issues including health insurance, raises, and contract length. The strike forced white-collar workers to clean hotel rooms and serve drinks. The Atlantic City Convention and Visitor’s Authority does not track monthly visitors. But a spokeswoman said that while no conventions were canceled during the strike, the number of gamblers surely decreased. Negotiators for Local 54 of the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees and the casinos agreed earlier in the week to a five-year contract. The strike affected seven of the city’s 12 casino-hotels.
– Associated Press
SOUTH
ABORTION CLINIC BOMBING EVIDENCE QUESTIONED
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Lawyers for serial bombing suspect Eric Rudolph tried to show yesterday that federal agents – not Mr. Rudolph – may have spread traces of explosives from a deadly abortion clinic bombing in Alabama to his North Carolina home.
Prosecutors have said that eyewitnesses and traces of explosives found in Mr. Rudolph’s home, including on a towel and chair, link him to the 1998 Birmingham bombing that killed a police officer and critically injured a nurse. However, under defense questioning during an evidentiary hearing yesterday, agents Richard Strobel and Gregory Czarnopys of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives both said they did not swab their hands to check for such traces before searching Rudolph’s trailer. Mr. Czarnopys also testified that the explosive element used in the bomb and found in Mr. Rudolph’s home was easily spread. Mr. Czarnopys said he changed clothes and showered between leaving the scene at the Birmingham clinic and searching Mr. Rudolph’s home, which would have removed any traces of explosives.
– Associated Press
MIDWEST
WOMAN, THREE CHILDREN DIE AFTER CAR PLUNGES INTO LAKE LONG
LAKE TOWNSHIP, Mich. – A woman apparently took a wrong turn and drove into a lake, drowning herself and three young girls. Karen Lynn Gilhooly, 46, was taking her daughter and two classmates to a dance concert Wednesday evening when the car plunged into Long Lake. Gilhooly may have taken a wrong turn onto a road that ends at a boat launch. She turned a short distance ahead of another road that goes toward the arts center where the concert was held. A sign warns drivers that the road ends, but it was dark and a light rain was falling, authorities said. “There is no indication of excessive speed or any other factor except mistaken location,” Grand Traverse County sheriffs said. The children killed were Sierra Fetterolf, 11, Anna Lynn Maas, 10, and Rowan Sanford, Gilhooly’s 10-year-old daughter. Anna was pulled out alive but died yesterday at a hospital in Grand Rapids.
– Associated Press