WLIU: New York Metro Area News (2008-01-04)

AP-NYC--Right Now,2254

Latest New York metro news, sports, business and entertainment:

FIREFIGHTER KILLED
NEW: Brooklyn blaze kills veteran firefighter

NEW YORK (AP) - Mayor Michael Bloomberg says a longtime
firefighter has been killed in a fierce blaze in Brooklyn apartment
building Thursday evening.
The mayor is calling Lt. John H. Martinson "a hero who put his
life on the line to keep us all safe."
The 40-year-old Martinson was among more than 100 firefighters
who worked to quell the blaze in a 25-story building on Bedford
Avenue in the Crown Heights neighborhood. Flames could be seen
through a 14th-floor window from the street below.
The fire department says a total of 10 other firefighters and
civilians were hurt, but their injuries aren't considered
life-threatening.
Bloomberg says Martinson was an 18-year veteran of the FDNY. He
is survived by his wife and their young son.

PORT AUTHORITY TOLLS
UPDATE: NY-NJ bridge tolls to go up 33 percent; vote today

NEW YORK (AP) - Transportation officials are expected to vote
today on a 33-percent increase in tolls for millions of drivers
crossing the Hudson River into New York City. But an official
familiar with the plans tells The Associated Press that thousands
of passengers on a commuter rail line will see fares rise less than
they feared.
The official says the Port Authority of New York and New
Jersey's board is expected to raise peak-hour tolls on its six
bridges and tunnels from $6 to $8.
But the official says the agency will not raise PATH train fares
from $1.50 to $2, as it proposed in November. The official says the
amount of the fare hadn't been decided by yesterday evening, but it
will be less than $2.
The official wasn't authorized to speak publicly about the
board's plans before today's meeting.

TEXT MESSAGING
Network overload: Happy New Year, your text message has failed

NEW YORK (AP) - A lot of people who sent out Happy New Year's
messages had them bounce back or never get through. An expert with
the wireless industry says the system couldn't handle the millions
of messages being sent at once.
Joe Farren of the C-T-I-A --The Wireless Association says it's
like any traffic artery during rush hour -- a large number of
people trying to get through at the same time. Millions of messages
did get through without problems on New Year's Eve -- But millions
of others did not.
That raises questions about communicating with family and
friends during a national emergency or natural disaster.
Professor Scott Midkiff - who teaches computer engineering at
Virginia Tech - says this has been a problem with the voice
cellular system and the network will only get more crowded with
text messaging.
Verizon says it's adding capacity to their systems.
Farren says 2007 could be the first year Americans spent more on
their cell phones than they did on land lines and pay phones. And
people are using their cell phones in different ways - text
messages, video messages, email.

LOUNGE SHOOTING
NEW: 50 years to life for NYC bouncer in two club-related
killings

NEW YORK (AP) - A New York City nightclub bouncer has been
sentenced to 50 years to life in prison in two killings he claimed
police committed.
Stephen Sakai declined to speak as he was sentenced yesterday in
state Supreme Court in Brooklyn. The 32-year-old was convicted last
month of second-degree murder in the 2005 deaths of Wayne Tyson and
Edwin Mojica.
Mojica had hired Sakai to work at a nightclub. Tyson was a
patron at another club where Sakai worked.
During his trial, Sakai claimed police killed the victims
because they were helping him gather evidence against corrupt
officers.
Authorities said Sakai made incriminating statements about the
killings after he was arrested in a deadly shootout outside a
trendy Manhattan lounge in May 2006. Sakai is awaiting trial on a
second-degree murder charge in the Manhattan case.

PARKING PLACARDS
NEW: Bloomberg: Let's trim number of parking placards, tackle
fakes

NEW YORK (AP) - Mayor Michael Bloomberg has announced plans to
reduce the number of city-issued parking placards, which allow
people to park in prime spaces off limits to other drivers.
He also wants to crack down on counterfeit and misused cards.
Critics say the seemingly widespread use and abuse of the
placards is partly responsible for the Big Apple's clogged streets
and the lack of curbside parking spaces.
The mayor is demanding that each city department reduce the
number of parking placards it issues by at least 20 percent by
March 1.
The mayor also says the police department will create a special
unit to go after people who use fake or unauthorized placards.
A spokesman for the mayor says there are now about 70,000
city-issued parking placards.

WEAPONS BUST
UPDATE: NYPD arrests man in car, finds huge weapons arsenal in
his home

NEW YORK (AP) - Police say they found a gigantic stockpile of
weapons after searching the car and home of a man they had arrested
near Wall Street.
They say the weapons cache included an assault rifle, a machine
gun and bullets that can tear through a protective vest.
The New York Police Department arrested the 36-year-old man
Wednesday night after getting reports that he was carrying a weapon
in downtown Manhattan.
Police say he's believed to be a weapons dealer. They say he
also had four bulletproof vests and a half-dozen police-style
radios.
The man has been arrested on charges of criminal weapons
possession.

DOG MAULS BABY
Brooklyn family's dog mauls 8-month-old boy to death

NEW YORK (AP) - An 8-month-old boy being cared for by his
grandmother was bitten on the head by his family's dog and killed.
Police and Emergency Medical Services were called to the family's
Brooklyn home shortly before 2 p.m. The boy, Andrew Stein, was
rushed to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead about an hour
later.
No one had been charged in the boy's death as of last night. The
Doberman pinscher was tranquilized by police, caged and taken to an
animal care center.
Police say it's too early to determine what would happen to the
dog.
Neighbors said the dog was docile and friendly and would allow
them to pet it. They said they felt sorry for the boy's
grandmother.

INN FIRE
Firefighters take ferries to battle inn blaze off Long Island

SHELTER ISLAND, N.Y. (AP) - Firefighters had to fill their hoses
from a harbor and some brought their trucks by ferry - to fight a
blaze that gutted one building and damaged another at the Dering
Harbr Inn on Shelter Island.
No one was hurt in the fire. Shelter Island Fire Chief Ron
Jernick says the building that was gutted was unoccupied.
Flames were fueled by a 30-mile per hour wind after the fire
started around 8:30 p.m. Wednesday. It took about 100 volunteer
firefighters until early yesterday to extinguish it, with some
volunteers coming from communities a ferry ride away.
Jernick says there are no fire hydrants at the inn so
firefighters got water from the bay.
The cause of the fire is under investigation, but Jernick says
it did not appear suspicious.
The Dering Harbor Inn includes a range of waterfront villas and
suites, according to its Web site. A call to the inn early today
was answered by a recording saying the establishment was closed for
the season until mid-May.

IDENTITY THEFT
Man arrested for getting woman's I-D from the trash

PORT JEFFERSON, N.Y. (AP) - A man rents a room in Port Jefferson
and finds personal information about his co-tenant in the trash,
and takes out a credit card in her name. Suffolk County Police say
that's the way it went down.
They've arrested 38-year-old Paul Kopetic and charged him with
identity theft.
Police say Kopetic obtained an American Express credit card in
the name of the woman with him as a second card holder. He then
used the card to charge $2,182 in various living expenses including
heating oil and dry cleaning.
Police say the woman was renting the house in March of 2007 when
she met Kopetic through Craigslist, after he answered an ad to rent
a room for sublet. In June of 2007 she moved out of the house and
was notified by American Express in August 2007 that she was in
default on payments on the credit card. The victim had never
applied for and was not knowledgeable that an American Express Card
had been issued using her name.
Police say Kopetic also obtained a Lay-Z-Boy MasterCard using
the womens personal information on which he charged $725.

BANK ROBBERY
Bank robbery in Albertson

ALBERTSON, N.Y. (AP) - The Bank of America in Albertson, Long
Island was robbed.
Nassau County Police say a man pried open a rear door of the
bank at 8:30 yesterday morning before the bank opened. Police say
the subject then waited inside the bank and held employees at
gunpoint as they arrived for work. After obtaining an unknown
amount of money the subject fled on foot out the rear door in an
unknown direction of travel. There were 5 employees present, no
customers. There were no injuries.
Police have a brief descrition of the suspect who had a black
handgun.
Detectives request anyone with information to call Crime
Stoppers at 1-800-244-TIPS.

MIRROR MARAUDERS
Mirror raiders: Westchester thieves prefer the side view

TARRYTOWN, N.Y. (AP) - Thieves in Westchester County have a new
target: cars' side-vew mirrors.
Tarrytown Police Lieutenant William Herguth says the glass was
stolen out of mirrors on about two dozen cars parked at two
residential complexes early Thursday.
The property manager at one of the complexes, the Edgemont at
Tarrytown Condominiums, says the cars were of many different makes
and models.
Meanwhile, at least eight similar thefts were reported in nearby
Ossining yesterday. Police in another local community, Greenburgh,
say the mirror marauders hit at least 30 cars at an apartment
complex there November 28th.
Greenburgh police have said thieves go after the mirrors because
they are easy to take and can be sold to junkyards and auto shops
for $10 to $20 apiece.

AMY FISHER
Amy Fisher makes six figure deal to endorse sex tape

NEW YORK (AP) - Former Long Island Lolita - Amy Fisher - says
rather than fight to try to quash a sex video of her and her
husband - that is all over the Internet - she is endorsing the tape
for a six figure payoff.
Fisher's husband Lou Bellera sold the sex tape to Red Light
District video of Los Angeles in August when he and Fisher were
getting a divorce. They have since reconciled, and Fisher filed a
federal lawsuit to get the video pulled from the Internet, saying
it was given without her permission.
Since being released, the video is number one in porn tape
downloads.
Fisher said tongue in cheek, "I always wanted to be number one
at something, but I didn't think it would be something like this."
She said the video is out there, and it's easier to settle for
an amount that "was enough to ease my embarrassment," than fight.
Fisher has tried to go legit since her teen-age affair with then
36-year-old Joey Buttafuoco in 1992, and then serving seven years
in prison for shooting his wife Mary Jo Buttafuoco.
But she says she can't shake her past.
Fisher wrote one book in prison. She wrote another since getting
out, and also worked as a columnist for the Long Island Press.
However her notoriety has the 33-year-old being invited as
celebrity guests at various clubs.
She admits explaining what to her six-year-old son and
three-year-old daughter why mommy's famous will be hard to do when
they get older.

BROADWAY ACTOR
Broadway actor admits endangering minor in teen touch case

NEW YORK (AP) - A Broadway actor has admitted to sexual
encounters with a 15-year-old female fan backstage at a theater and
in his home, but his lawyer is blaming the girl and questioning her
motives. James Barbour played the beast in Disney's "Beauty and
the Beast." He pleaded guilty yesterday to two misdemeanor counts
of endangering the welfare of a minor. He is to be sentenced on
February 29th to 60 days in jail and three years probation. Because
the counts are misdemeanors, he will not have to register as a sex
offender.
His lawyer, Ronald Fischetti, says if the actor had to register
as a sex offender, he would not have been able to travel without
reporting to authorities and would not have been able to work with
children. Fischetti says his client pleaded guilty so he could put
the case behind him and get on with his career.
Assistant District Attorney Maxine Rosenthal's says the
41-year-old Barbour admitted to the court many of the sexual
specifics of which he was originally accused.
Barbour was starring on Broadway in "Jane Eyre" in June 2001
when a high school drama teacher arranged for the girl, an aspiring
actress, and her parents to see the musical.
But Fischetti says the girl initiated the sexual encounters and
then waited five years before filing a complaint against him.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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