Yesterday, the defense rested in the trial of State Senator Hiram Monserrate. The Queens Democrat is accused of slashing his girlfriend Karla Giraldo on purpose in a jealous rage (he and she both say it was an accident) and faces felony charges. Monserrate opted for a bench trial, so Justice William Erlbaum will decide on a verdict; Erlbaum said, "I don’t know how this thing is going to turn out as we sit here today"
The Daily News reports that State Senator Hiram Monserrate refused to take a plea deal for "reckless assault" misdemeanor which is why he's headed to court to face charges that he allegedly assaulted his girlfriend with a glass. The News points out the plea would have allowed him to avoid jail time and keep his Senate seat, but if he's found guilty on one felony count (he's charged with three), he "faces seven years in prison and would automatically lose his seat." The paper got hold of "secret" grand jury testimony—Monserrate's girlfriend Karla Giraldo said that when the hospital "realized he was a politician... They started gossiping and calling the police... They were telling me he was at a hospital of crazy people, that he was married out in Central America, many things more for me to be angry and upset and to sign a complaint against him, but I was not going to sign because I always said from the beginning that this was an accident." But a cosmetologist says Giraldo called her before going to the hospital, saying, "I'm very afraid, I don't want anyone to see my face," plus there's also a video allegedly showing Monserrate roughly yanking Giraldo in the apartment building hallway. His lawyer simply said he's is innocent and ready for trial.
Yesterday, State Senator Hiram Monserrate told reporters, "Sen. Monserrate is innocent, and I will not be resigning, thank you," after news that he was indicted on felony assault charges for allegedly hitting his girlfriend with a broken glass. However, Monserrate (D-Queens), who was sworn in as State Senator earlier this year, was suspended from chairing the Consumer Affairs Committee.
Prosecutors in a Queens court yesterday began making the case against newly sworn in State Senator Hiram Monserrate on charges of second-degree assault for last month's slashing of his girlfriend, Karla Giraldo. A judge refused to lift the order of protection separating the two and did not allow Giraldo to speak before the court. Monserrate withdrew his previous waiver of his right to a speedy trial, so the case can now be brought before a grand jury.
Today, the NY Times and Daily News report that the police have video footage of State Senator Hiram Monserrate and his girlfriend Karla Giraldo during their apparent dispute last month. Giraldo ended up in the hospital, with a black eye and requiring 20 stitches for a gash near the eye, and the authorities arrested Monserrate, charging him with assault.
The Daily Politics' Elizabeth Benjamin reports: "[State] Senator-elect Hirram Monserrate was arrested early this morning after he brought a woman believed to be his girlfriend to Long Island Jewish Hospital with severe lacerations on her face that will require multiple sitches to close, sources confirmed. Monserrate... was detained for questioning and subsequently arrested, according to an NYPD source. The incident occurred at an apartment at 37-20 83rd St. in Jackson Heights, Queens." The Post adds, "the woman's face was cut with a bottle in what investigators believe was a domestic fight." Monserrate, who is a soon-to-be former City Councilman representing Queens, has been in the news recently for being part of the dissident State Senators, the Gang of Four, until he decided to "move forward and not waste one more minute debating politics" by supporting Senator Minority Leader Malcolm Smith.
State Assemblyman Adam Clayton Powell 4th, Democrat and son of the trailblazing Harlem politician Adam Clayton Powell Jr., was arrested for drunk driving on the upper West Side at 2:30 a.m. this morning. According to the Daily News, an unidentified woman passed out in the back of the car was so intoxicated she had to be taken to a local hospital. Powell failed a breath test at the scene by a small margin and, while at the station house, refused to take a chemical sobriety test. He faces charges punishable by up to a year in jail.
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama march into tonight's Ohio debate with their arms swinging over a 2006 photograph of Obama visiting Kenya. The Obama campaign blamed the Clinton campaign for "shameful" tactics, while the Clinton campaign denied responsibility and said the Obama campaign should be "ashamed" of thinking the photo would be controversial.
As David Tarloff is held in the murder of therapist Kathryn Faughey, the Manhattan DA's office is planning on showing how the crime was premeditated. Tarloff was charged with second-degree murder, second-degree attempted murder (when he slashed another doctor, Kent Shinbach), and first-degree assault.
After the NY Times story revealed how NYC votes for Barack Obama appear to have been undercounted for the unofficial (yet official enough to be sent to the AP and other news outlets) results on primary night, State Senator Bill Perkins of Harlem spoke out. Perkins, who supports Obama, told the Post
: "Every election has problems, but in this case, all the problems seem to have been his," said state Sen. Bill Perkins (D-Harlem). "He got all the zeroes and undercounting.
Three and a half months after Queens orthodontist Daniel Malakov was gunned down at a Queens playground in front of his young daughter, his estranged wife was arrested for his murder. Dr. Mazoltuv Borukhova was charged with murder and conspiracy and taken to a precinct house from her Forest Hills home. Malakov's mother told the Daily News, "They're dirty...her whole family, mother, sisters, all of them are animals. They committed such a dirty act, and I ask God for them to get everything they did to me, so that it would come back to them from God."
Imecca Burton, her mother, and civil rights lawyer Norman Siegel held a press conference in front of Police Headquarters yesterday to decry the handcuffing of 10-year-old Imecca, who was handcuffed by police in front of PS 25 where she attends elementary school. Police officers witnessed a fight on her school bus and in the ensuing events Imecca was handcuffed. Witnesses said that Imecca was swearing, kicking, and screaming, which is why the cops cuffed her. They were removed once she composed herself. The 10-year-old said she was afraid that she was going to jail and would never get out. "I never thought I'd see my brothers and sisters again," the New York Post reports. The Post labels Imecca Burton as "disabled" when describing her handcuffing and later elaborates that she has attention deficit disorder and dyslexia. Norman Siegel plans to sue the city on her behalf.
The family and friends of slain dentist Daniel Malakov yelled at murder suspect Mikhail Mallayev (pictured) in a Queens courtroom yesterday. Malakov was gunned down last year when he was dropping off his daughter to his ex-wife at a Queens playground. His brother yelled, "Hang him up!" as other yelled "Shoot him!" and "Take off his head!" when Mallayev left.
As the police try to reconstruct the events of Thursday night's mugging attack, a little more information is offered about some of those involved. Subway conductor Maurice Parks was walking home when he was attacked by a group of muggers in Harlem, at West 139th Street and St. Nicholas Avenue late Thursday night. When stabbed, Parks took out his own knife to defend himself. By the end, the police arrested a wounded attacker and another teen attacker, and found that a man who died in the clash was actually a bystander.
The family of Carol Simon is grieving after she was killed while walking on Eastern Parkway near Bedford around 5:30PM on Saturday. Simon, a 35-year-old nurse's assistant, had been on her way to take her son to swimming lessons when an argument between two men became violent and one pulled out a gun.
Arno Herwerth, the Long Island man who the DMV rejected his GETOSAMA vanity plate, then sued them now wants to have a 9-11 commemorative license plate available to the Empire State’s motorists – something several other states have for their drivers. However, in New York then Governor George Elmer Patkai vetoed the idea in 2006 and put the brakes on any new optional license plates thanks to a pro-life groups suing states, including New...
First responders gathered in front of the NYC Medical Examiner's office to protest how the ME has classified deaths seemingly related to Ground Zero illnesses. State Senator Eric Adams said he would introduce legislation making sure first responders who worked at Ground Zero will "get the same line-of-duty benefits" as September 11 victims. Recently, the ME's office has not named two rescuers, who worked at the World Trade Center site after September 11 and later...
D is for drunk and disorderly, not boobs and breasts. At least according to New Jersey State Senator Richard Codey. The Times first reported yesterday on the halftime events at Gate D at Giants Stadium during Jets games. Hundreds of fans gather on the exit ramp, chanting at women and encouraging them to expose their breasts. If they don't lift their shirts, the women are met with boos and sometimes are spit at or have...
Police Commissioner Ray Kelly announced this morning that they had arrested a suspect in the murder of orthodontist Daniel Malakov. Kelly said that the suspect, Mikhail Mallayev, was a relative (by marriage) of Malakov's ex-wife. Malakov was shot in the chest after just after dropping his 4-year-old daughter Michelle to his ex-wife at a Queens playground on Sunday morning. He and his wife, Dr. Mazeltuv Borukhova, had been embroiled in a bitter divorce and custody...
To the surprise of no one, New Yorkers are not in favor of the MTA's proposed fare-and-toll hikes. Residents, transit advocates and elected officials have been speaking at the MTA's public hearings all week, raising a number of questions about the MTA's service, the state's and city's contributions to the MTA, and effect it will have on riders. The Manhattan public hearing reminded of us Festivus, or at least its "public airing of grievances"...
The custody battle over Michelle Malakov, a 4-year-old who witnessed her father being shot to death at a Queens playground, continued in Queens Family Court. And the testimony of State Senator Diane Savino underlined how the dispute between the slain man's family and his ex-wife has gone almost full-tilt crazy. Queens dentist Daniel Malakov had been awarded temporary custody of his daughter for about a week. On October 28, he was dropping her off to...
As more cases of staph infections are being reported (a Newark public school security guard has MRSA, leading the school to be disinfected), parents are growing increasingly concerned about how schools are responding to the epidemic. Yesterday, school officials held a meeting at IS 211 in Brooklyn, the school Omar Rivera Jr. attended before dying from MRSA two weeks ago, to explain how it is dealing with the potentially deadly disease.
The police arrested the man who fired the shot that hit a 16-year-old boy who looked outside his window earlier this week. Tavin Alves, a quiet ninth grader who was shot in the head and found slumped against a wall by his 5-year-old brother, was taken off a respirator by his family on Thursday; yesterday, they held a Stop Gun Violence rally.
The professor at Columbia University's Teacher College whose office door was found with a noose on it spoke out for the first time yesterday. Madonna Constantine told students that gathered for a rally, "This is a heinous and highly upsetting incident. I am upset that our community has been exposed to a blatantly vile incident like this. It is an act of cowardice. I would like the perpetrator to know that I will not be silenced."
Governor Spitzer can rest a bit easier now: The Albany County DA found that the governor's aides broke no laws when they tried to use the state police to discredit a rival, State Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno. DA David Soares will release a report today, but in the meantime, his spokeswoman's statement said, "This office found no illegal conduct. To the contrary, we found that the governor, his staff, and the New York State Police were acting within their authority in compiling and releasing documents to the media concerning the use of state aircraft."
How did we miss this? Last week, City Hall News had an interview with State Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno and it included this photograph of Bruno boxing! Bruno is, of course, riding relatively high as Governor Spitzer's reputation is tainted in the wake of Troopergate, and Bruno can play the unwitting victim of Spitzer's aides dirty tricks plotting.
We knew it was too long without hearing about Foxy Brown and her legal woes! A Brooklyn woman is accusing the rapper of throwing her Blackberry in her face. Given Foxy's past brushes with the law, she may be in big trouble.
In 2005 Barbara Walters mentioned her distaste for public breastfeeding on The View and was met at the show's studio with "lactivists" protesting her statement.
We were skimming 1010WINS when we saw this headline Spitzer Energy Adviser Resigns Amid Threat Investigation. What? An energy adviser was involved in the plot to discredit State Senator Joseph Bruno? But actually it's something nuttier:
Energy adviser Steven Mitnick confirms that he has resigned from his position in the Spitzer administration.Continue reading "All the Governor's Men"
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