STATEWIDE

MINARIK COMMENTS RAISE CALLS FOR HIS RESIGNATION

Governor Pataki, New York City Council Speaker Gifford Miller, and a number of Democrats criticized the new state GOP chairman, Stephen Minarik, for linking the Democrats with Lynne Stewart. On Monday Mr. Minarik said the Democratic Party was the party of Lynne Stewart, the civil rights lawyer convicted last week of aiding terrorists by passing messages from her imprisoned client, an Egyptian sheik, to one of his colleagues outside the prison.

In criticizing the Democratic National Party for selecting failed presidential candidate Howard Dean, Mr. Minarik said, “The Democrats simply have refused to learn the lessons of the past two election cycles, and now they can be accurately called the party of Barbara Boxer, Lynne Stewart, and Howard Dean.”

His comments have prompted a wave of criticism. Yesterday, Mr. Pataki, a Republican, said the “Democratic Party doesn’t have anything to do with Lynne Stewart.”A spokesman for the city Board of Elections, Christopher Riley, said Ms. Stewart, 65, is a registered Democrat.

A state senator, David Paterson, said yesterday that if Mr. Minarik didn’t apologize, the state GOP should “reconsider” whether to keep him on. Mr. Miller said the chairman’s comments were “divisive” and “wrong.”

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

MANHATTAN

BLOOMBERG SAYS COURT OVERSIGHT OF HOMELESS SERVICES SHOULD END

Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday that a court-appointed panel had recommended that 22 years of court oversight of the city’s family shelter system should end because “the city of New York has earned the opportunity to go forward into a new era.”

The Legal Aid Society took the city to court on behalf of homeless families 22 years ago, and ever since then, the city has been mired in a succession of court-ordered mandates that Mr. Bloomberg said had “stifled progress for years with counterproductive litigation and hurt homeless families.”

While the panel studied the issue, the city was protected from further litigation, and, according to Department of Homeless Services Commissioner Linda Gibbs, that gave the city enough breathing space to enact real reforms.

“The two-year litigation respite gave us a chance to move away from crisis management to a sane and responsive service-delivery approach,” she told reporters at City Hall yesterday. The panel’s recommendation is not binding. The courts will have to decide that the findings are sufficient to end court oversight. The city has been negotiating with the Legal Aid Society to see if they can come to an agreement that would settle the litigation amicably.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

PAINTINGS OF DOGS PLAYING POKER FETCH $590,400 AT AUCTION

A pair of paintings from the famed series depicting dogs playing poker sold for $590,400 at auction yesterday. The winning bid set a new auction record for artist Cassius Marcellus Coolidge, whose previous top sale was $74,000 for a painting at a Sotheby’s auction in 1999, said Alan Fausel, director of paintings at Doyle New York, which handled the sale. The winning bidder was a private collector from New York.

The two works – “A Bold Bluff” and “Waterloo” – were among 16 paintings Coolidge was commissioned to create for Brown & Bigelow, a St. Paul, Minn.-based advertising company, in 1903. Of the 16, nine, including the two sold yesterday, are of dogs playing poker.

The two works sold yesterday capture moments in a poker game played by five dogs, among them a St. Bernard that ends up collecting the pot on a bluff. Doyle had estimated the paintings would bring in between $30,000 and $50,000.

– Associated Press

ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL ACCUSED OF SEXUAL ABUSE IS CAPTURED

An assistant principal who fled the country after he was charged with sexually abusing teenage boys at a Manhattan public high school and bail jumping pleaded not guilty yesterday after he was returned to face the charges.

Juan Taveras, 41, of Manhattan, was captured Saturday in Santiago, the Dominican Republic, by a squad that included New York detectives and federal agents. A warrant for his arrest had been issued in New York last August after he jumped $30,000 bail. Mr. Taveras was arraigned in Manhattan’s state Supreme Court on two indictments, one containing 134 counts accusing him of sex abuse, forcible touching, endangering the welfare of a child, and other charges, and the other accusing him of bail jumping. Prosecutors allege Mr. Taveras fondled, groped, and sodomized seven students at the Norman Thomas High School and in a summer youth employment program at the school from June 2003 through July 2004.

– Associated Press

CITYWIDE

DAUGHTER OF ASSEMBLYWOMAN WINS COUNCIL SEAT

The daughter of an assemblywoman from the Bronx was voted in as the newest member of the City Council yesterday after a heated campaign. Maria del Carmen Arroyo, a longtime health-care executive and the daughter of Assemblywoman Carmen Arroyo, won 1,828 votes, or 49.5% to replace Jose Serrano, according to preliminary returns from the Board of Elections as of 10:30 last night.

Ms. Arroyo will be sworn in today as the representative for the 17th council district, which stretches from Mott Haven to Hunts Point. For voters in the district, the race was a tricky one where family name recognition and confusion were said to have gone a long way. One candidate, Charles Serrano, had the same surname as the outgoing council member. Two others, Alberto Torres and George Torres, had the same last name. The latter Torres, who was the chief of staff to the former council member, was knocked off the ballot a few weeks ago because he had not collected enough valid signatures.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

ADVISER TO MARKOWITZ TO RUN FOR COUNCIL

A senior adviser to the Brooklyn borough president, Marty Markowitz, announced his resignation yesterday and said he would focus on a run for the City Council. The adviser, Bob Capano, will run on the Republican Party line for the Brooklyn district that includes Bay Ridge, Dyker Heights, Bensonhurst, and Bath Beach.

In 2003, Mr. Capano had aborted his campaign for the seat, and backed the other GOP candidate Rosemary O’Keefe. Vincent Gentile, a Democrat, ultimately won the seat in a special election and replaced Martin Golden, who won election to the state senate. Mr. Gentile, who is currently facing charges of sexual misconduct from a former chief of staff, has raised roughly $56,000 for re-election. Mr. Capano has raised nearly $16,000, according to disclosures filed with the Campaign Finance Board last month.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

COUNCIL CALLS FOR MORE FUNDING TO COMBAT NEW AIDS STRAIN

A new and aggressive strain of HIV found in the city has advocates and members of the City Council calling for more funding to combat the use of crystal methamphetamine. Last week the city’s health commissioner, Thomas Frieden, announced that a gay man in his 40s had tested positive for a new and alarming strain of HIV that was both resistant to most treatments and that progressed to AIDS within months not years. Those on hand yesterday said Mayor Bloomberg needed to put the $670,000 allocated last year back in the budget to fund prevention and detoxification programs for users of the drug.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

UPSTATE

POLICE: SUSPECTED MALL SHOOTER AND FRIENDS MADE PIPE BOMBS

Two friends of a man charged with shooting his way through a crowded shopping mall were arrested after authorities discovered a videotape of them detonating pipe bombs, law enforcement officials said yesterday.

Though the arrests stem from the investigation into the Sunday mall shootings that left two people injured, there was no indication that shooting suspect Robert Bonelli Jr. intended to use an explosive device at the mall, said Town of Ulster Police Chief Paul Watzka. Police searching Mr. Bonelli’s home after the shooting found a videotape depicting the manufacture and detonation of pipe bombs. The two men arrested were depicted in the videotape along with Mr. Bonelli. Kenneth Stine, 24, and Liborio Valguarnera, 23, both of the upstate city of Glasco, were arrested Monday.

– Associated Press

POLICE BLOTTER

MAN FATALLY STABS NEIGHBOR WITH ICE PICK, POLICE SAY

A Bronx man attacked and killed his neighbor with an ice pick yesterday morning, police said.

After an early-morning dispute, Roy Tabor, 45, retrieved an ice pick from his apartment and stabbed Roy McCaster, 64, several times in the torso, police said. They lived a few doors away from each other on the fifth floor of their building at 50 West Mount Eden Ave. in the Morris Heights section of the Bronx. Frantic calls to 911 by others in the building came too late to save McCaster who was dead by the time police arrived at the scene.

– Special to the Sun

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