CITYWIDE

Moynihan Station Faces Possible Rejection

The $900 million project to transform the Farley Post Office building into Moynihan Station could face rejection today as it seeks final approval before the Public Authorities Control Board in Albany. The board includes representatives of Governor Pataki, the Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, and the state Senate majority leader, Joseph Bruno. Messrs. Bruno and Pataki support the Moynihan plan, but yesterday Mr. Silver expressed some doubt. He said the project was complicated and that he was still looking for answers on some issues. The vote was already postponed from Wednesday. Last June, Mr. Silver’s vote on the board killed Mayor Bloomberg’s plan to build a football stadium on the far West Side. Some civic leaders have called for the Moynihan Station project to be combined with a larger plan by two developers to move Madison Square Garden and redevelop the existing Penn Station.

— Staff Reporter of the Sun

Brooklyn Voodoo Man Sentenced For Murders

A man who built a voodoo shrine using his ex-girlfriend’s panties before killing her mother and a dog and slashing her teenage cousin was sentenced yesterday to 28 years to life in prison. Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Robert Collini sentenced Pierre Carrenard to consecutive terms of 25 years to life for killing the woman, two years for killing the dog and one year for assaulting the 16-year-old girl on August 9, 2005, District Attorney Charles Hynes said. The ex-girlfriend Francois MacDaly, told police Carrenard 36, harassed her repeatedly after she broke up with him. On the day of the crimes, she said, Carrenard called her at work and threatened her mother, Esperance Labidou. Police found a shrine in Carrenard’s apartment made of Ms. MacDaly’s panties and one of his socks tied to gether with a green vine. Carrenard explained in court that the shrine “was a sort of spell to control her spirit.”

— Associated Press

STATEWIDE

Faso Calls on Spitzer To Disclose Costs

Republican candidate for governor John Faso called on attorney general Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat who is running for governor, to disclose how much the state’s lawsuit against a former chairman of the New York Stock Exchange was costing New York taxpayers. “From day one, this whole case has been more of a taxpayer-funded public relations campaign for Mr. Spitzer than a lawsuit on behalf of the public interest,” Mr. Faso said in a statement yesterday. “Taxpayers won’t see a dime from this headline-grabber, but they will pay for years of legal maneuvering and litigation by the Attorney General’s office.” Mr. Spitzer filed a complaint against Mr. Grasso more than two years ago contending Mr. Grasso’s $190 million pay package was unreasonably high for someone running a non-profit organization and that those on a compensation committee that voted on his package had conflicts of interest. The suit has been stuck in appeals. Mr. Grasso is requesting that a state judge delay a trial without a jury, which is set for October 16.

—Staff Reporter of the Sun

Pataki Denies Protection For Credit Card Holders

ALBANY — A measure that would have protected credit card holders from interest rate increases levied because they were late on other bills was vetoed yesterday by Governor Pataki. Advocates said the bill would have been the first in the nation to prohibit credit card companies from increasing interest rates solely because a customer failed to pay an unrelated bill on time. Mr. Pataki commended the effort to protect consumers, but said the bill was fatally flawed. He said it was written too vaguely while carrying a severe penalty for a practice that has been legal for years. “The average family has $9,000 in credit card debt,” said Russ Haven of the New York Public Interest Research Group, which supported the bill. “New York could have really staked out important ground in protecting consumers.”

—Associated Press

IN THE COURTS

‘Godfather’ of Italian Mafia Appears In Court

An aged Canadian, reportedly the “Godfather” of the Italian mafia in Montreal, was arraigned in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn yesterday after a two-year extradition dispute.Vito Rizzuto, 60, is accused of the murder of three captains in the Bonanno crime family in 1981. The bodies of two of the victims were found in Queens in 2004, more than 23 years after the discovery of the first corpse. Mr. Rizzuto was the most significant member of the Bonanno crime family in Montreal, prosecutors have said. Yesterday, Mr. Rizzuto pleaded not guilty, through his attorney, to a 2004 racketeering indictment that charged 27 members of the Bonanno family.The prosecutor, Greg Andres, told the judge, Nicholas Garaufis, that “Mr. Rizzuto is the sole remaining defendant” named in that indictment. He is being held in a federal jail in Brooklyn.

— Staff Reporter of the Sun