New York Desk

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The New York Sun

TRISTATE


KERIK ACCUSED OF LETTING COMPANY WITH ALLEGED MOB TIES FIX APARTMENT


The former New York City police commissioner, Bernard Kerik, could be in serious legal trouble. Yesterday, the Division of Gaming Enforcement in Trenton, New Jersey, accused the former Homeland Security nominee of letting a New Jersey company with alleged ties to the Mafia renovate his Bronx apartment when he was the New York corrections commissioner. Allegedly, the work was in exchange for his helping the company obtain contracts with New York City. In a complaint, which asked New Jersey’s Casino Control Commission to revoke a license from Interstate Industrial Corporation, the casino investigators alleged that Interstate paid more than $180,000 to renovate Mr. Kerik’s apartment for him in exchange for helping to secure contract clearance from New York City. The Bronx district attorney has been investigating the 1999 renovation since last year. That investigation, according to a spokesman, Steven Reed, is still open. The New Jersey complaint alleges that Mr. Kerik had close ties with the DiTommaso family, the owners and operators of Interstate. He allegedly helped his brother, Donald Kerik, secure a job at the company, and the best man from his wedding, Lawrence Ray, worked there. In 1999, the New Jersey authorities charge, Mr. Kerik vouched for Interstate’s integrity to the city’s Trade Waste Commission. That came just as the company was apparently paying for an overhaul of his apartment. While the investigators turned up information about Mr. Kerik’s possible involvement with alleged criminals, they did not charge him with any crime. Mr. Kerik’s lawyer, Joseph Tacopina, did not return a call last night requesting comment.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun


STATEWIDE


REPORT: HOSPITALS LOST $127M IN 2004


Hospitals in New York lost a combined $127 million in 2004, according to data compiled by the Healthcare Association of New York State. The finding marks the seventh consecutive year that hospitals in the state have operated in the red, a fact that industry experts attribute to decreased reimbursement rates, rising costs, and a mix of other financial pressures. “We have to make fundamental changes in New York if we are to reverse this trend,” the president of the association, Daniel Sisto, said in a statement. The findings were based on financial statements provided by 213 nonprofit hospitals statewide. The association said hospitals in the Empire State also fared far worse financially than their counterparts nationally.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun


STATE JUDICIAL REVIEW PANEL ISSUES REBUKES TO TWO JUDGES


A state judicial review panel issued official rebukes to two judges yesterday, ruling that they abused their power in handing down sentences that were not warranted. The state Commission on Judicial Conduct slapped a Supreme Court judge, Duane Hart, with a censure for violating ethical standards by unfairly holding a litigant in contempt. Judge Hart issued the contempt ruling because the litigant’s attorney brought up an out-of-court encounter between his client and the judge. The conduct commission said the attorney’s act was appropriate, and Judge Hart’s response was “intemperate” and “ill-considered.” In the other case, the panel ruled that a family court judge, Richard Lawrence, committed a “gross abuse of discretion” by throwing a man in jail for fidgeting in court, sighing, and turning his back on the judge.


– Special to the Sun


CITYWIDE


LAWMAKERS SAY NEW YORK TO LOSE 9/11 AID


Congressional budget negotiators have decided to take back $125 million in September 11, 2001, aid from New York, which had fought to keep the money to treat sick and injured ground zero workers, lawmakers said yesterday. New York’s elected officials had sought for months to hold on to the funding, originally aimed to pay for workers’ compensation costs stemming from the 2001 terrorist attacks. But a massive labor and health spending bill moving fitfully through House-Senate negotiations will go ahead, meaning the funding will be taken back, elected officials said yesterday.


– Associated Press


100 POLICE OFFICERS MEMORIALIZED


The names of 100 police officers who died in the line of duty were added to the memorial wall inside police headquarters, bringing the total number of fallen officers honored to 608. Mayor Bloomberg and his police commissioner, Raymond Kelly, unveiled the portion of the wall that listed the names of the recently added members of service. “We are in the presence of heroes,” Mr. Bloomberg said yesterday in the lobby of 1 Police Plaza. Family members of some of the deceased officers attended the ceremony. The careers of the officers, of all ranks, span from 1849 to 1997.The majority of the deaths predated computers and other basic record keeping.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun


ALBANY


PIRRO TAKES CLINTON TO TASK OVER BYRD BIRTHDAY PARTY


Senator Clinton’s possible Republican challenger, Jeanine Pirro, criticized Mrs. Clinton yesterday for co-sponsoring a birthday party for Senator Byrd, a Democrat of West Virginia, citing his long-ago membership in the Ku Klux Klan and a racially charged 2001 comment. Mrs. Pirro’s complaint came a day after the Washington Post reported that Mrs. Clinton and the Senate’s eight other Democratic female senators were hosting an 88th birthday party for Mr. Byrd last night at the home of civil rights pioneer Frederick Douglass.


– Associated Press


IN THE COURTS


NORMAN BACK IN COURT


Legal troubles are mounting for Clarence Norman Jr., Brooklyn’s former Democratic Party chief. Kings County prosecutors, in a trial that began Monday, are charging Norman with making personal use of an October 2001 campaign contribution. Norman allegedly deposited a $5,000 check, from the Thurgood Marshall Democratic Club, into his personal bank account. In September, he was convicted of two counts each for violating election law and falsifying business records. He is expected to be sentenced for those crimes at the end of this month. A long-time treasurer of the Committee to Re-elect Assemblyman Clarence Norman Jr., Carmen Martinez, took the stand yesterday, telling the jury she did not believe her boss was permitted to deposit the check personally. The defense argued the check was a reimbursement – clumsily transferred by the Thurgood Marshall organization – for a personal loan Norman made to a Democratic Assembly member, Diane Gordon, who had needed the money to pay staffers working on the failed mayoral campaign of Alan Hevesi.


– Special to the Sun


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