Archive » January – June 1999

Archive

January – June 1999

June 28, 1999
Who was with Volpe?
Was police Officer Charles Schwarz wrongfully convicted of holding down Abner Louima in the bathroom of the 70th Precinct stationhouse when Justin Volpe sodomized him with a wooden stick?

June 21, 1999
Commish finds skies friendly
Is Police Commissioner Howard Safir becoming Lee Brown? Should New Yorkers call him "Out of Town" Howard?

June 14, 1999
Upstaged for another honor
Departing Chief of Department Louis Anemone was to have been honored last Tuesday by a Brooklyn Law School student group, together with other law enforcement lights, including former police commissioner Ben Ward and the FBI's New York City director Lewis Schiliro.

June 7, 1999
Election was revolutionary
With some help from the spoiler candidacy of PBA trustee Ed Mahoney, the reformer Pat Lynch won the presidency of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, an event last week that can only be described as revolutionary.

May 24, 1999
News turns tail on colleagues
Daily News owner Mortimer Zuckerman's name didn't appear on the un-bylined piece of puffery in Friday's News headlined "Press, city seek peace pact" - although he produced and directed it.

May 17, 1999
A ‘spoof’ that spurred probe
A leading candidate for president of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association is fending off a charge that 13 years ago he dressed up Ku Klux Klansman-like at a PBA convention.

May 10, 1999
The dream team prepped
Even presiding judge Eugene Nickerson - who appeared to be in somnorific overdrive during opening arguments - leaned forward in his chair, eyes wide open as Abner Louima told his tale of horror to a packed and silent courtroom.

May 3, 1999
Can the movie be far off?
From deep within the archives of Anne Arundel County, Maryland, circuit court, we bring you part two of the never-before-published life story of Police Commissioner Howard Safir - by Howard Safir.

April 26, 1999
Story not one for the books
From the archives of Anne Arundel County, Maryland's circuit court, case number C93-04841CN, we bring you the never-before-told life story of Police Commissioner Howard Safir - by Howard Safir.

April 19, 1999
High-ranking party poopers
In a move as unprecedented as the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association's no-confidence vote in Police Commissioner Howard Safir, none of the department's top brass attended union President Lou Matarazzo's retirement dinner Thursday.

April 12, 1999
Safir’s answers beg questions
In a grown-up version of "The dog ate my homework," Police Commissioner Howard Safir maintained last week he didn't know he was part of a $1.5 million lawsuit filed by his wife over a minor car accident.

April 5, 1999
Deputy mayor’s tale rings true
A top black police official and friend of Deputy Mayor Rudy Washington expressed astonishment that Washington, the highest-ranking black in the administration of Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, had never told anyone in the Police Department that white officers had harassed him on more than one occasion, presumably because of his race.

March 29, 1999
Safir’s museum to open soon
The Oscars behind them, Police Commissioner Howard Safir and his wife, Carol, are soon to attend a premiere here in New York - the opening of Carol's police museum, which your tax dollars are paying for.

March 22, 1999
Diversity class backfires
The Police Department held its first "cultural diversity" class for the Street Crime Unit since the shooting death of Amadou Diallo, and what a mess it became.

March 15, 1999
Past top cops back protests
Wilhemina Holiday, deputy police commissioner for community affairs from 1984 to 94, appeared Friday outside One Police Plaza, supporting protesters of the fatal police shooting of an unarmed African immigrant, Amadou Diallo

March 1, 1999
Feud in the way of Diallo case
There's this feud between the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association and the flamboyant Queens Boulevard attorney Marvyn (note the "y" on Marvyn) Kornberg that is already affecting their clients in at least one of the city's two most visible police abuse cases - Amadou Diallo and Abner Louima.

February 22, 1999
PBA lawyers get the boot
Two of the four cops accused in the Bronx shooting death of West African immigrant Amadou Diallo have ditched their union-selected attorneys, presaging strains and potential conflicts on the all-police team.

February 15, 1999
Numbers tell sobering story
As most everyone knows by now, the four officers who shot unarmed street peddler Amadou Diallo were members of the police department's street-crime unit.

February 8, 1999
Why the feds joined Bronx DA
There are perhaps two reasons the U.S. attorney for Manhattan's Southern District, Mary Jo White, has joined the Bronx district attorney's office in investigating last week's fatal police shooting of an unarmed African peddler, Ahmed Diallo.

February 3, 1999
Story behind crime statistics
Former Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro yesterday offered an explanation for why the administration of Mayor Rudolph Giuliani withheld news for six months that subway crime was underreported: fear that the press would distort the story.

February 1, 1999
The man with the plans
Poor Police Commissioner Howard Safir. Not for nothing did his predecessor, Bill Bratton, call him the Rodney Dangerfield of law enforcement.

January 18, 1999
Chief cleared; Safir is mum
Police Commissioner Howard Safir confirmed Wednesday what this column reported a week ago - that the department (i.e. Safir) has exonerated Assistant Chief Gene Devlin of retaliation in a long-running sexual harassment case.

January 11, 1999
And one probe begets another
After a drawn out and highly unusual internal investigation of a burgeoning sexual harassment scandal, two police officers are literally making a federal case that the department has taken revenge upon them.

January 4, 1999
Looking-glass predictions
Here are some predictions about what New Yorkers might expect in 1999.