News: November 2009 Archives

The Fire Department may be forced to cutback on staffing to cover the costs of the increasing number of firefighters taking sick leave.

After being hit hard with a cancellation of their series, the producers of "The Unusuals" are now on the receiving end of a lawsuit from actor Charles Buckley. The New Yorker filed a notice at the Queens Supreme Court after being injured during filming, where he was body slammed repeatedly on the concrete.

Defying conventional wisdom, crime is not on the rise despite the miserable economy. Police records reveal that as the city faces a 10.3-percent unemployment rate and record numbers of homeless families, "the number of major crimes is continuing to fall this year in nearly every category," the Times reports.

Website Ride the City debuted in 2008, integrating Google maps with data about ideal cycling routes. The site enables users to map a bike ride along as many bike paths as possible, or take their chances with the "fastest," most direct route. Tomorrow the site will launch a new version, which will now maintain elevation data for every city and show riders how much climbing to expect from any given route. Ride the City will also allow visitors to create a user profile and save their favorite routes.

A cop shot in the line of duty last year is suing the NYPD for outfitting him with a bulletproof vest and a holster that he claims weren't up to snuff. Officer Shane Farina, 39, was wearing a department-issued vest when he was shot point blank by a suspected fare-beater who grabbed his partner's gun in a Queens subway station last year

Is leftover change on your Metrocard bumming you out? It's bumming everyone out, according to the Daily News today. Ever since the MTA changed how it formulated the bonuses on pay-per-ride cards, from 20% (buy five trips, get a sixth for free) to 15%, New Yorkers have been accumulating Metrocards with unusable spare change on them, while the MTA has been absorbing that decent chunk of unused change!

When the smoke clears from Albany's latest inept attempt to get a grip on the budget crisis, one casualty will likely be the state's anti-smoking campaign. Governor Paterson, a committed proponent of the anti-smoking program, has nevertheless proposed a $10 million cut in order to help address a $3.2 billion deficit. The cutback would reduce funding for programs that provide free nicotine patches and help Medicaid patients quit smoking, among other things. Naturally, the cigarette industry and its allies are passing around the cigars.

The mother of Rachel Uchitel, the woman suspected of having an affair with Tiger Woods, told Newsday, "I think she has a very good heart, and that heart was broken on 9/11. She's had a very tough life... whatever direction she's gone off on may have been not good for her.. Underneath it there's a very sweet and wounded person from that experience."

It's no Man Getting Hit By Football, but this video of a Dodge van getting smashed by a wrecking ball is probably worth ten of your seconds, depending on what you've got going on today. While there is some debate as to the origins of the video—one YouTube commenter astutely declares, "has to be fake i live in nyc and I would have heard about this shit in the news and on the front of the ny post"—we're pretty sure this looks like a filmed stunt for a movie, or maybe a viral marketing ad. If so, you're welcome Astroboy!

While most subway stations rely on sidewalk grates for fresh air, the new stops on the long-awaited Second Avenue line will be cooled with a modern ventilation system. But residents and politicians say the ventilation system, which will be housed in permanent above-ground structures, "many as large as midsize apartment buildings, rising up to nine stories tall," will turn vibrant Upper East Side blocks into "dead corners," blighting the neighborhood and lowering property values, according to the Real Deal.

Oh no! Reader Marc Bloomgarden sent us the above picture, saying, "this iconic Weeping willow has fallen in to the Pool in Central Park." It survived the August storm that took down so many trees in the Park, so we reached out to the Central Park Conservancy to find out what felled this willow. We'll update when we hear back from them.

 

In recent years, the lefty activist group Time's Up has been widely associated with the monthly Critical Mass bicycle rides in Manhattan—a source of ongoing acrimony between police and cyclists. But the group, started by environmental activist Bill DiPaola back in 1987, has had a green finger in a wide array of progressive causes beyond cycling advocacy. Now Time's Up's wide-ranging agenda over the past two decades has been underscored by the recent acquisition of a trove of Time's Up documents by the Tamiment Library at NYU.

Sports Illustrated announced today that it has named Yankees Captain and sometime Post Cover-Model Derek Jeter its Sportsman of the Year. Remarkably, Jeter, 35, is the first Yankee to be given the honor since it was first handed out starting in 1956. Sports Illustrated Group Editor Terry McDonell gushed about Jeter's leadership abilities on and off the field: "Derek Jeter has always presented himself with class; he does numerous good works for the community with his Turn 2 Foundation, which is one of the most efficient, effective foundations of its kind; and he's extremely generous with not just his money but with his time, which in many cases is more valuable. He also had another signature year on the field."

This week's forecast is all over the place as the weather spasms its way from fall to winter. It starts on a warm, wet note and looks to end with cool, dry conditions. In between it could be an interesting ride. Along with light rain, we will see temperatures holding steady in the mid 50s through this afternoon.

Commuters waiting for the bus have been tossing their trash on the sidewalk and lawn in front of Rosanna Gennarelli's Bronx home — leaving her to face hundreds of dollars of littering summonses. The city has repeatedly fined the 51-year-old for violations including "scattered bottles, cigarette packs, paper bags, pieces of paper, tissue wrappers and other debris in the front yard,” hitting her with $300 tickets as recently as Nov. 14 and Nov. 19.

With NY State running out of money because the State Legislature has been unable to offer a plan for billions needed in budget cuts, Governor Paterson announced he was moving ahead with a plan for $1.6 billion in savings, "I first presented my Deficit Reduction Plan on October 15, and since that time the Legislature has refused to take necessary action to maintain our State’s fiscal stability. As I said directly to New Yorkers last week, if legislators won’t face up to their responsibility and join me in making the tough decisions - I’ll do it myself. I will continue to fight every single day to keep New York State afloat in the midst of this historic economic crisis - with or without the help of the Legislature."

The 78-year-old ex-con who's been arrested some 37 times over the past three decades is in trouble again, this time for missing her final court date two weeks ago. You may recall that Katherine Kelly was famously busted in October 2008, after a pickpocket sting at the Upper West Side Fairway turned up a wallet in her bra. (An NYPD source called her a "pickpocket terrorist.") Earlier this month, Supreme Court Justice Ronald Zweibel signed an arrest warrant for Kelly, despite being informed she was stuck in a car outside court.

A Staten Island gang war that has claimed the lives of four men so far this month has gotten so intense that members of the Bloods are apparently skipping town to stay safe. According to the Daily News, the internal squabble between Bloods members from New Brighton and those from Port Richmond and Mariners Harbor turned deadly on Nov. 7, when an argument over a girl lead to the shooting of Jermaine "Big Den" Dickerson in an Arlington housing development.

Has Anthony Michael Hall gone Hannibal on us? Details have surfaced about his recent assault on an ex (Diana Falzone), and reportedly he bit her forehead! The police report, obtained by Radar, says Hall "bit his girlfriend's forehead" and "pushed, shoved and spit at" her while inside of her apartment around 2 a.m. on November 10th.

A legal secretary is suing a midtown law firm for allegedly cutting her loose just hours after she revealed that she had a cancerous tumor. In October 2007, Theodora Benedict sent an e-mail informing her employers at Tarnow & Juvelier that doctors had diagnosed her with a rare tumor behind her sinuses, and she would have to miss a week for surgery and a week for recovery. But instead of "get well soon" cards, Benedict, 61, says she got the boot—two hours after clicking send.

The National Retail Federation says that Black Friday weekend sales grew slightly, 0.5% over last year, because shoppers were snatching up bargains. The NRF, which expects holiday spending to fall 1% this year, said, "While retailers are encouraged by the number of Americans who shopped over Black Friday weekend, they know they have their work cut out for them to keep people coming back through Christmas. Shoppers can continue to expect retailers to focus on low prices and bargains through the end of December."

This is a pretty crazy time to be a teenager in the Bronx. Another adolescent was gunned down this weekend — this time fatally — with a bullet meant for someone else.

A ultra-right-wing blogger and radio talk show host will go on trial in Federal District Court in Brooklyn tomorrow, accused of making death threats against three federal judges who refused to overturn handgun bans in Chicago. But defendant Hal Turner claims that since 2003, he has been working undercover for the FBI, which paid him thousands of dollars to inform on neo-Nazis and white supremacist groups. Turner says the FBI even coached him to make racist, anti-Semitic and other threatening statements.

On Saturday, there were reports of windows falling from a Tribeca building, likely due to the strong winds, and now it turns out the building in question was the new Goldman Sachs headquarters at Murray and West Streets. And it's not the first time things have been falling from the nearly finished 43-story building.

Today's end-of-day links: A funeral for victims of a Crown Heights fire was held, foreclosures seem to never end in Queens, law firms should check who they are suing, a Times reporter writes about his son's gecko's constipation and more.

Just one mile from the spot where 15-year-old Vada Vasquez was shot in the head by a stray bullet, a 16-year-old girl was caught in the crossfire after a Bronx house party, the Post reports.

A petty larceny suspect escaped from a TriBeCa police station last night only to be dragged back to the First Precinct in tears. Orlando Reyes, 21, was being transferred to Central Booking when he reportedly broke free from the Ericsson Place stationhouse and hid in an alley nearby according to the Daily News.

Links from around the -ist sites: SFist pondered a video showing a BART cop using (excessive?) force, DCist was confused by the crazy guy stopped traffic downtown to demand $200 million while standing atop a U-Haul van, throwing Molotov cocktails, Chicagoist was glad to know about the latest epidemic sweeping schools across the Midwest—ball-tapping—and more.

With the New Jersey Nets likely to tie the NBA's record of for most consecutive losses (17) at the start of the season tonight when they play the Los Angeles Lakers, the team has fired coach Lawrence Frank. ESPN reports that the team was going to fire Frank after the game, "Yet it appears that Nets management determined that it had to make the move before facing the Lakers after reports became more widespread that Frank's dismissal was imminent."

Tiger Woods issued a statement on his website about his Friday car accident, blaming himself for the incident, calling his wife Eiln's actions "courageous," and refuting the "many false, unfounded and malicious rumors" (namely that he and his wife got into a fight preceding the accident), "This situation is my fault, and it's obviously embarrassing to my family and me. I'm human and I'm not perfect. I will certainly make sure this doesn't happen again."

Usually you would hear the words as you made your way to your seats, “Good Afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Yankee Stadium.” The cadence was deliberately slow, with each syllable pronounced and it reverberated across the façade of the old stadium, bouncing back at you from different angles. Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Frank Gifford, Reggie Jackson, Lawrence Taylor, Chris Mullin, Derek Jeter, all of them were introduced by Bob Sheppard. And despite his absence from the new stadium, Derek Jeter used a recording of Sheppard to introduce his at bats there.

New Year's Eve celebrations might turn out ending a little earlier this year, because the number of New York area bars that have applied for a special permit allowing them to keep serving booze until 8 am has plummeted by 60 percent. According to the Post, the number of "night permits" that extend the last call by four hours fell from 388 watering holes in New York City, Long Island and Westchester last year to just 165 this year.

New York City judges spent taxpayer money on seemingly personal purchases like meditation retreats, framed photographs of themselves, and an iPod, according to the New York Post. Each year, judge's receive an expense allowance of $10,000 each — a citywide total of $12.6 million per year — to cover their work-related costs. But the stipend, which doubled in value on Nov. 1, is sometimes used on "frivolous expenses," the tabloid reports.

The crooks who robbed a 64-year-old for his television — but couldn't escape with the unwieldly flatscreen — shot the victim because his achy knee kept him from following their orders.

The city's street gangs have turned to Twitter to communicate amongst themselves, taunt their foes, and plan brawls, according to the Daily News. Police even think an adolescent might have been shot in the legs on Lenox Avenue over an online turf war started by the Original Young Gangsters clique on Twitter.

At 4-6, the Jets are not on the path to the playoffs. At this point, their season is all about making themselves feel better for next year and after that. That's why the debate over a starting quarterback is misplaced. Why sit Mark Sanchez now? Rex Ryan may talk a lot, but he's not silly enough to bench the man the team drafted to be a franchise quarterback.

The report says, "The failure to finish the job represents a lost opportunity that forever altered the course of the conflict in Afghanistan and the future of international terrorism." According to the NY Times, "The committee report, prepared at the request of Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, the committee’s Democratic chairman, concludes unequivocally that in mid-December 2001, Mr. bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, were at the cave complex, where Mr. bin Laden had operated previously during the fight against Soviet forces. The new report suggests that a larger troop commitment to Afghanistan might have resulted in the demise not only of Mr. bin Laden and his deputy but also of Mullah Muhammad Omar, the leader of the Afghan Taliban. Mullah Omar, who also fled to Pakistan in 2001, has overseen the resurgence of the Taliban."

The driver suspected in a fatal Bronx hit-and-run on Friday has a suspended license and a lengthy automotive rap sheet. Sheldon Reid, 28, is accused of mowing down 40-year-old Sonya Powell at around 8:30 pm as she walked home from Christmas shopping in Wakefield with her fiancé.

• Pittsburgh 8 Rangers 3: It has been two nights to forget for New York, but the question is, where did the defense go? Surely it cannot be the loss of Wade Redden that sparked the total breakdown in the defensive zone. Whatever it is, the Rangers have an off day Sunday to figure out why they have given up 13 goals in two games before the Penguins come to MSG Monday Night.

About 50 dogs rescued from puppy mills in Utah and overcrowded shelters in Missouri arrived in Long Island on Friday, where they will be put up for adoption before the holidays. The pooches, which were saved from filth, abuse, and the risk of euthanasia in September, enjoyed a special Thanksgiving meal of "canned turkey with potatoes and carrots; duck and sweet potato dinners, and bagged pheasant" at their layover in Chicago before flying to New York.

The man or woman responsible for presiding over the trial of Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four other suspected plotters of the 9/11 attacks will likely be chosen with the kind of machine that "might have been used to call out bingo numbers in a church fund-raiser," according to the Times. The 20-some active Manhattan federal court judges — as well as a few who are on senior status — will have their names put into a lottery machine to determine who will preside over the high profile case, which could last years, and will likely result in the assignment of around the clock security the rest of the judge's life.

TMZ has some crazy details on what may have happened to number 1-ranked golfer Tiger Woods, who drove his SUV into a fire hydrant outside his Florida home early yesterday morning and suffered some facial lacerations. The gossip website says, "Tiger Woods did not suffer facial lacerations from a car accident. They were inflicted by his wife, Elin Nordegren -- according to a conversation Woods had Friday after the accident."

Tiger has yet to be formally interviewed by the Florida Highway Patrol -- that should happen this afternoon. But we're told Tiger had a conversation Friday -- with a non-law enforcement type -- detailing what went down before his Escalade hit a fire hydrant.

Continue reading "Report: Wife Scratched Tiger Woods' Face, Chased His SUV; Update: Police Unable To Interview Couple Today"

Allmir Lekperic, the 26-year-old Staten Island driver charged with fatally striking an elderly couple walking to a Thanksgiving Eve church mass and leaving the scene, posted the $50,000 bail. And his sister was also arraigned, for her part in trying to help him cover up his crime.

Anecdotal reports suggest that crowds on Black Friday—the day after Thanksgiving—were up compared to last year, but retailers won't know how that translated into sales for another few days. Macy's president and CEO Terry Lundgren told the NY Times that over 5,000 waited outside the Herald Square location yesterday (more than last year) and said this year's customer was going to be more careful, "They've got a budget that they’ve planned to spend and I think most consumers will stick to that. We expect that this will be a market-share holiday season. We don’t need consumers to spend more money. We just need to make them spend more money with us."

The skies above Newark Liberty International Airport are a disaster waiting to happen, according to federal investigators who are concerned about the simultaneous use of intersecting runways. Problems arise when a plane needs to abort its landing — which occurs about once every 700 flights at Newark. Current protocol forces the diverted plane to make a sharp right turn directly across the flight path of planes taking off and landing, "allowing little margin for error," according to CNN.

The White House released a photograph showing State Dinner crashing couple Michaele and Tareq Salahi meeting President Obama. The Washington Post reports, "The security breach has caused hand-wringing inside the White House, bewilderment among Tuesday night's guests -- and late on Friday, prompted an apology from the Secret Service." Secret Service director Mark Sullivan said the agency was "deeply concerned and embarrassed by the circumstances surrounding the State Dinner."

Here's why you shouldn't lean on train doors. Two doors on a JFK Airport AirTrain fell off the shuttle — which had just undergone maintenance work — as it picked up its first load of passengers yesterday, according to the Post.

Doctors at St. Vincent's Hospital exposed a Washington Heights woman to the HIV virus when they used dirty medical equipment, a lawsuit alleges.

Black Friday is typically the most lucrative day for traffic agents because many shoppers, out-of-towners, and forgetful locals assume it's a parking holiday. In past years, traffic agents have issued about 20,000 tickets on the day after Thanksgiving — netting the city around $900,000. But yesterday marked the Muslim holiday of Id al-Adha, which commemorates the willingness of Ibrahim to sacrifice his son to God, and as such, the city suspended alternate-side-of-the-street parking rules on Black Friday.

In his race for a third term, the richest man in New York City spent an astounding $102 million of his $17 billion fortune. New filings reveal that Mayor Bloomberg shelled out about $174.53 per vote in his narrower-than-expected victory over Democratic challenger Bill Thompson, far exceeding his expenditures of $85 million in 2005 and $74 million in 2001, according to the Times.

Three men shot a 64-year-old in Queens in an attempt to steal his new flatscreen television on Black Friday — but the 47-inch TV wouldn't fit in their escape vehicle.

A popular deejay in Chelsea's gay nightclub scene has gone missing. Last seen on September 27th behind the decks at Splash Bar on West 17th Street, 53-year-old James Moyer (also known as DJ Jimmy) hasn't been seen, hasn't returned emails or phone calls, and hasn't been to his apartment for nearly two months.

The family of Vada Vasquez, the 15-year-old Bronx girl who took a stray bullet to the skull last Monday, declined their usual Thanksgiving feast this year, postponing it until the teen can eat again. But the five young men accused of involvement in the shooting were given a seemingly generous Thanksgiving meal in jail yesterday. Dinner included turkey with dressing, yams, steamed greens and carrot cake!

From CBS News, "Authorities say Tiger Woods has been seriously injured in a car wreck in Florida. The Florida Highway Patrol says the PGA star hit a fire hydrant and a tree as he pulled out of his driveway early Friday in his 2009 Cadillac sport utility vehicle." He was taken to the hospital. "The highway patrol says the crash is still under investigation, and charges are pending. However, the highway patrol said the crash was not alcohol-related." Update: Woods' spokesman said the golfer was released from the hospital in good condition, while the "mayor of Windermere, Fla., reportedly said Woods was treated for facial lacerations." TMZ has a photo of the hydrant.

The couple who apparently crashed the Obamas' first State Dinner on Monday has now caused the Secret Service to investigate how a couple with reality show dreams managed to get through the security. Secret Service spokesman Edwin Donovan wouldn't given details on how Michaele and Tareq Salahi managed to attend the event, "We're being intentionally vague on that. All we are saying is that procedures we have in place weren't followed."

Ladies, meet Martin Berres, a 62-year-old single man who describes himself on his MySpace page (martynycforever!) as a "classy native New Yorker." His heroes include Niccolò Machiavelli, and he is "in better shape and health than most men 1/3 my years. Do not let the age mislead you; I am young in heart and looks... I consider myself to be a find." Marty would love to meet you provided you meet the "paramount" requirement of "outside beauty" and "inside beauty." Oh, and you should also have lots of money and jewelry he can pawn—according to two women who say Berres swindled them out of $400,000.

New York State's dire budget situation gets the front page treatment from the NY Times today. And the Times sounds the alarm bells and points a finger in the direction of a certain state body:

"Without a budget deal, New York will be left with just $36 million in the bank by the end of December, according to current projections. And the money will last that long, officials say, only if the state chooses to fully exhaust its emergency reserves by tapping several billion dollars’ worth of temporary loans from its rainy-day fund and short-term investments.

Continue reading "New York State Running Out Of Money"

On Wednesday afternoon, DOT officials had met with the pastor at Our Lady Queen of Peace church on Staten Island to discuss the problem of reckless drivers on the street that runs by the church and its school. Rev. Pancrose Kalist warned city officials about the dangerous situation on New Dorp Lane, where crossing guards routinely witness drivers blasting by them and running the red light. Six hours after his meeting, an elderly married couple was killed by a hit-and-run driver with numerous traffic violations who sped through a red light.

For some reason, spending billions on skyscrapers and man-made palm-shaped island leads to...debt! So far, the Dow Jones, S&P 500 and Nasdaq have fallen at least 1% (even up to 2% as soon as the markets opened today), due to, as the Wall Street Journal puts it, "fears...about the potential fallout of debt prolems at Dubai World, the city-state's largest corporate entity, which asked creditors for a six-month stay on repayment of its $60 billion in debts." UBS actually estimates that Dubai's overall debt may be over $80 billion.

Graphic photos have surfaced from the recent murder on the D train. Photography student Paola Nuñez Solorio was on her way home with fellow students when Gerardo Sanchez allegedly stabbed Dwight Johnson because he wouldn't move his bag from an unoccupied seat to make room on the half-empty train. The two men did not know each other. Solorio took 120 photos during the murder, and today the Times has published four of them online. The images are very disturbing, as is Solorio's first-hand account of the murder:

Like clockwork, stores hyped up their Black Friday/Doorbuster sales and potential shoppers waited outside for hours, in hopes of getting great deals. A crowd was waiting outside a Jersey City Best Buy; one person told WCBS 2, "There's a lot of people on this line for laptops, like HP laptops for $197. Normally it's $500 or $600," with another possibly bragging that he "was here yesterday since 12 o'clock in the afternoon"—as in noon on Thanksgiving.

For those that thought the Giants' overtime win over the Falcons last week spelled a turn around, think again. New York gave up the first 16 and final 10 points in a 26-6 loss to Denver on Thanksgiving night. That drops the Giants to 6-5 and puts them in a world of hurt in the NFC East. The Giants, who snapped a four-game losing streak of their own Sunday, helped the Broncos break theirs. Denver held the Giants to 57 yards rushing and sacked Eli Manning three times. Big Blue's quarterback needed 40 attempts to accumulate 230 yards and an interception.

Yesterday, WikiLeaks began posting "half a million US national text pager intercepts," saying, "The archive is a completely objective record of the defining moment of our time. We hope that its entrance into the historical record will lead to a nuanced understanding of how this event led to death, opportunism and war."

City Island residents have finally gotten rid of the NYPD firing range on nearby Rodman's Neck in the Bronx, which has been disturbing their peace since the Kennedy administration. Last week the City Council approved the site of a 40-acre Police Academy in College Point, Queens, where the NYPD will relocate training to an enclosed firing range. But some residents say their aural nightmare endures!

Police arrested two 3rd graders and a 5th grader suspected of bringing a box cutter and a knife to their Bronx elementary school on Wednesday. According to the Post, a school safety agent nabbed a 9-year-old with a box cutter inside P.S. 2 on Franklin Avenue in Morrisania at around 9:30 am. When questioned, the student ratted out his accomplices — an 8-year-old and an 11-year-old — who reportedly were plotting an assault against a faculty member.

After his surprisingly competitive mayoral bid against Mayor Bloomberg, there have been various rumors about what City Comptroller Bill Thompson might do next. First there were murmurs of a Senate run, and then ones that Andrew Cuomo was eyeing him as a running mate during for his gubernatorial campaign. Now the NY Times says the Senate run is just one of three options that Thompson is mulling.

While the Obamas' first State Dinner was hailed as a glamorous evening, one thing is looking bad: The security, because a couple from the now-filming "Real Housewives of D.C." managed, somehow, to crash the dinner and mingle with the VIPs. While the Secret Service emphasized that no one was in danger because of the "magnetometers and several other levels of screenings," a spokesman did admit there was "a Secret Service checkpoint which did not follow proper procedure to ensure these two individuals were on the invited guest list."

Investigators uncovered the remains of an infant encased in cement and a Rubbermaid container when they broke up a suspected sex trafficking ring in Sunset Park. Federal prosecutors allege that Domingo Salazar, 33, smuggled a young Mexican woman into the country, forced her to turn tricks, and then refused to provide medical care for their three-month-old baby — whose remains were recovered in their 40th Street apartment on Tuesday.

While in Washington D.C. yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg said the city will start to use students' test scores when evaluating teacher tenure. The NY Times called the proposal one "that has been bitterly opposed by the teachers’ union and criticized as putting too much weight on standardized exams."

Just days after a student was suspended from Stuyvesant High School for allegedly setting fires, investigators say a copycat arsonist has been lighting blazes in the esteemed Lower Manhattan school — and taunting police in hieroglyphics.

Last night, a couple in their 70s were fatally struck by a vehicle as they were crossing a Staten Island street to attend a church mass. The Staten Island Advance reports, "Lillian Sabados [77] was pronounced dead at Staten Island University Hospital, Ocean Breeze, at 4 this morning. Her husband, Peter S. Sabados, 78, was pronounced dead shortly after the 7:15 p.m. accident in front of our Our Lady Queen of Peace R.C. Church."

The family of the 15-year-old girl who took a stray bullet to the skull last Monday has something incredible to be thankful for today: doctors expect the teen to make a full recovery. After performing brain surgery to remove the bullet from Vada Vasquez's skull, doctors put her in medically-induced coma and cautioned relatives that she would most likely suffer some degree of brain damage. But now surgeon Narayan Sundaresan believes that although the bullet damaged her left temporal lobe, the area of the brain responsible for speech, she still "can make a full recovery."

In hockey news, the Rangers and Devils won, the Islanders lost. And in the depressing basketball update, the Knicks and Nets lost—the Nets are now 0-15.

Days after leaving CNN earlier this month, speculation began that Lou Dobbs might consider running for Senate in 2012, challenging Democrat Robert Menendez. Now he's been confirming that the thought has crossed his mind—as has the idea of running for President at some point.

The Giants stayed out of the abyss this past Sunday. Losers of four-straight, they blew a 14-point fourth quarter lead, but managed to prevail in overtime to keep their season moving. Now, they have to go on the road in a short week and beat a Denver team that has its own problems. Denver started out 6-0 on the season and has lost four games in a row to date. Things have gotten so bad that they started fighting each other last week.

            

Last night, President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama held their first state dinner at the White House. According to Politico, the "first couple applied their formal-but-comfortable style to a social event with international implications," with the President toasting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in a giant tent on the White House lawn, "Mr. Prime Minister, today we worked to fulfill our duty — bring our countries closer together than ever before. Tonight, under the stars, we celebrate the spirit that will sustain our partnership — the bonds of friendship between our people."

Even though prosecutors say his job is a sham, a judge ruled that convicted mafia racketeer Dominick Dionisio will be allowed to continue working at the popular Brooklyn pizzeria Lucali while he is on house arrest.

Earlier this year, we were moved by the plight of little Jasmina Anema, a 6-year-old with leukemia who needed a bone marrow transplant. While she is still fighting the diseases, Jasmina is having a big week—not only did she reunite with Rihanna on Monday, she is scheduled to meet President Obama today, thanks to the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

Bed bugs are on the rise in schools, NY1 reports. Though the city couldn’t provide any hard data on the number of infestations, officials told the station that the bed bug problem has gotten worse as the hard-to-exterminate critters have become more common.

Opponents of the Obama administration's plan to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other suspected terrorists in New York City will hold a Dec. 5 rally in front of the federal courthouse to demand that the trials take place elsewhere, according to the Daily News. "This is perhaps the most dangerous decision any President and any attorney general have ever made," said Rep. Pete King (R-Nassau), who publicized the event alongside a new group called 9/11 Families for a Safe and Strong America.

The holidays must be a lucrative time for drivers who lure passengers into their unlicensed taxis at airports, but the Port Authority is making it tough for them this year. Yesterday Queens DA Richard Brown announced [pdf] that a crackdown on unlicensed taxi drivers has resulted in 18 arrests at JFK and LaGuardia. The arrests come a month after Governor Paterson signed a bill increasing penalties for unlawfully soliciting ground transportation at an airport, making it a Class B misdemeanor punishable by up to 90 days in jail and/or a fine of up to $1,250.

An 18-year-old student at Sacred Heart University claims that three lacrosse players at the Connecticut school — one of them a Long Island native — sexually assaulted her in a dorm room last weekend. The victim was having consensual sex with 19-year-old freshman Timothy Sanders, when the suspect allegedly held her down and shouted for his two teammates, freshmen Nicholas Travers and Zachari Triner, to join in, according to police. The two men then purportedly ran naked into the dorm room and touched the woman inappropriately. After she screamed and struggled, Travers and Triner fled.

Even though the State Legislature has been in special session the past few weeks at Governor Paterson's request because of the state's huge $3.2 billion deficit, no action has been taken to, you know, deal with the deficit and cut the state budget. Yesterday, Paterson asked for special, emergency power to cut the budget himself, which lawmakers, naturally, thought was crazy. Senate Minority Leader Dean Skelos declared, "This is not the old Soviet Union."

Exhortations to "Close the deal you c---" and "Stop being a f---ing p----y" are allegedly commonplace at GDS International, which is being sued by a 26-year-old Egyptian-American female employee for an unspecified sum. Lobna Abdelrehim is alleging "discrimination" based on gender and religion, as well as "retaliation" for opposing discrimination in the workplace—her lawyer Jack Tuckner tells the Post that GDS's publishing sales culture is "an extreme sort of jock fraternity ethos that's really unfathomable in this day and age. The bosses are all aware of it, and they could care less. It's like a throwback into the 1950s."

Dean Meminger, the former Knicks great nicknamed "The Dream," is in a burn unit at Jacobi Hospital after suffering injuries from a four-alarm fire in the Bronx. The Fire Department is continuing to investigate the cause of the blaze, after reports that crack pipes were found in a building where the fire was started—and some of the crack pipes may have been in Meminger's rented room.

The day before Thanksgiving is traditionally one of the busiest times of the year for travel, with roads and airports clogged with those heading for turkey, family, friends and relaxation. However, the economy has made some people rethink their travel plans. According to WCBS 2, "Thanksgiving travel plummeted a staggering 25 percent between 2007 and 2008, and many of those habits seem to be sticking this year. The number of people traveling is likely to stay about the same, inching up only by about 1.4 percent, according to an AAA prediction."

The Knicks' record is now 3-11 after a loss to the Lakers and the Nets are at 0-14, just three losses short of tying the NBA's record.

A judge announced on Monday that he will likely throw out the conviction and dismiss the indictment of a Bronx man who was incarcerated for four years on rape charges that his accuser has admitted were made-up. Though he didn't immediately clear William McCaffrey's name, State Supreme Court Justice Richard D. Carruthers said "it seems from what I hear, the case against William McCaffrey should be dismissed," according to the Times.

More than a week into deliberation on the fourth racketeering trial against one-time Gambino boss John Gotti Jr., the jury still hasn't come up with a verdict — and one of its members wants a vacation.

Are city cabbies making "sun tea" in their vehicles? Of the 44,000 TLC drivers on the streets, most working 12 hour days, you can imagine how difficult it is for them to find a place they can relieve themselves. So many allegedly "resort to going in the street or peeing in bottles stowed under their seats."

Brooklyn's Joe Tiralosi doesn't remember much about that day in August when he went to New York Presbyterian Hospital feeling sick and disoriented, then collapsed. But last week the 56-year-old father of two visited the hospital to thank doctors for not giving up on him just because his heart stopped beating for 47 minutes after a sudden cardiac arrest. All told, it took 4,500 chest compressions and eight shocks from a defibrillator to bring him back from the brink. Doctors are calling it a medical miracle, but Tiralosi's also lucky the E.R. he visited happened to have some special equipment.

The 15-year-old Bronx girl who was put in a medically-induced coma after taking a stray bullet to the skull has spoken for the first time since the incident, eight days ago. A source tells the Daily News that Vada Vasquez's first word was "Mom." Her condition has been upgraded to stable and a spokeswoman at Lincoln Hospital says, "She's improving. She's in stable condition and recognizes family members."

A nonprofit organization accused of serving as a "front for the Iranian government" donated $100,000 to Columbia University just months before Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made a controversial appearance at the school.

    

As you may have read in our newsletter, on this day in 1966 New York City experienced the smoggiest day in the city's history... and the details read like a horror movie. After 9/11, the NY Times touched upon three particularly smoggy years in the city, saying "Most of the horrors of New York's environmental past, like the grim air episodes in 1953, 1962 and 1966, were chronic and cumulative. Most past events had a thousand sources and causes — a vague diffusion of responsibility that made no one responsible."