CITYWIDE

COUNCIL ADOPTS $52.9B BUDGET

With the ink barely dry, the City Council late last night overwhelmingly adopted a $52.9 billion budget for the fiscal year that begins Saturday. In a vote that was delayed for hours while copies of the budget were printed, council members approved the spending plan. Mayor Bloomberg and the council speaker, Christine Quinn, agreed to the budget on Tuesday after two weeks of negotiation that produced little tension between the administration and the council. Excluding a $3.4 billion surplus, the $52.9 billion budget is an increase of about 5.4% from the $50.2 billion budget adopted last year.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

CHENEY TO HEADLINE FUND-RAISER FOR REP. GARRETT

Vice President Cheney will headline a fund-raiser for the re-election campaign of Rep. Scott Garrett of New Jersey at the Waldorf-Astoria on Friday. The decision to host the fund-raiser in New York follows the cancellation of a similar event in New Jersey earlier this month. A spokesman for the Democratic National Committee said that Rep. Garrett’s “apparent reluctance” to stand alongside the vice president in his own district is a sign that “New Jersey voters are joining voters across America in seeking new leadership in Washington.”

– Special to the Sun

IN THE COURTS

COMPTROLLER CANNOT ANNUL CONTRACT WITH SNAPPLE

The state’s highest court in Albany ruled yesterday that the city comptroller, William Thompson Jr., could not annul the city’s exclusive contract with Snapple Beverage Corp. because the mayor and city officials could not verify that all of the legal procedures associated with the contract had been followed properly. The chief judge, Judith Kaye, said that faulty paperwork does not justify an investigation into the substantive nature of a legal deal. In 2003, the city agreed to sell Snapple products exclusively at city property in exchange for Snapple’s promise to promote New York City through its own initiatives.

– Special to the Sun

FORMER POLICE CHIEF CLOSE TO PLEA DEAL IN CORRUPTION CASE

Bernard Kerik, the failed nominee for homeland security chief whose extravagant home-improvement project made him the target of a bribery probe, was angling yesterday for a plea deal designed to spare him jail time and further embarrassment. Recent negotiations with prosecutors had produced a tentative agreement in which Mr. Kerik would appear in court on Friday morning and admit to non-criminal administrative violations, his attorney, Joseph Tacopina, said.

– Associated Press

BAR: EFFORT TO THROW OUT SUITS CHALLENGING WIRETAPPING ‘TROUBLING’

The city bar association told a federal judge that it finds “deeply troubling” the Bush administration’s efforts to throw out lawsuits that challenge its wiretapping program. In a brief filed Wednesday, the Association of the Bar of the City of New York encouraged Judge Gerard Lynch to allow a lawsuit opposing the NSA’s program of eavesdropping without a warrant to go forward. The government has claimed that the lawsuit requires the disclosure of documents that would cause “exceptionally grave damage” to national security.

– Special to the Sun

SECOND GUILTY PLEA IN LOPEZ-ANTHONY WEDDING VIDEO CASE

A New Jersey man who was arrested after he and an accomplice tried to sell Marc Anthony and Jennifer Lopez’s stolen wedding video back to the couple for $1 million pleaded guilty yesterday to attempted grand larceny. Steven Wortman, 49, a retired postal worker from Sayreville, admitted in Manhattan’s state Supreme Court that he and Tito Moses, 31, tried during telephone negotiations to get amounts ranging between $250,000 and $1 million for the stolen video.

– Associated Press

POLICE BLOTTER

POLICE ARREST SUSPECT IN 2001 ATTACK ON GAY MAN

The suspect in a high profile attack on a gay man in 2001 was arrested Wednesday night, police said. Police apprehended John McGhee at John F. Kennedy International Airport after they learned he was returning from England, where they believe he has been living for several years. The arrest caps a five-year investigation into the attack. Edgar Garzon was attacked after leaving a gay bar in Queens, police said. Garzon lingered in a coma before dying without regaining consciousness. Mr. McGhee was charged with second-degree murder, manslaughter, and robbery.

– Special to the Sun

PARENTS CHARGED WITH ENDANGERING DISABLED DAUGHTER

The parents of a wheelchair-bound Manhattan girl were arrested yesterday after police said they left her alone in a stairwell for several hours. Gladys Maldonando, 47, and Samuel Teixeira, 52, of East 105th Street, were charged with reckless endangerment and endangering the welfare of a child, police said. Neighbors became concerned after they heard the 8-year-old girl making noise in the eighth-floor stairwell shortly after midnight. The girl was brought to Metropolitan Hospital in stable condition.

– Special to the Sun

MOTHER CHARGED IN GIRL’S DEATH ADMITS TO KICKING THE CHILD

Prosecutors charged a Brooklyn mother in her 3-year-old daughter’s death yesterday, after she admitted to punching and kicking the child. According to a criminal complaint, Jessica Rosado, 18, told detectives that she punched and kicked her daughter in the stomach, and hit her head and body. She faces charges including criminally negligent homicide, manslaughter, and endangering the welfare of a child.

– Special to the Sun

POLICE: THREE TEENAGERS UNDER ARREST FOR HATE CRIME

Three white teenagers were under arrest last night after they allegedly physically and verbally abused two black teenagers on a street in Brooklyn, police said. The two victims, age 16 and 17, were riding their bikes near the corner of Florence Avenue and Celest Court around 9:00 p.m., when a car full of men in a brown car approached them, police said. The men allegedly made “anti-black” statements and assaulted both teenagers, police said. A hate crimes task force later found the three teenagers, all aged 17, and they were subsequently arrested. The men were identified as Alessandro Cerciello, Christopher Rapuzzi, and Joseph Desimone, police said. They were charged with various hate crimes, including assault, unlawful imprisonment, and aggravated harassment.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun