New York
He’s Been a Killer and a Mob Associate. Is He a Hit Man?
![He’s Been a Killer and a Mob Associate. Is He a Hit Man? He’s Been a Killer and a Mob Associate. Is He a Hit Man?](https://newspub.live/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/merlin_203679354_6e2be58f-b900-4749-9358-0a3de4142475-facebookJumbo.jpg)
Good morning. It’s Thursday. Right now we’ll take a look at a 73-year-old profession legal who has been implicated in a plot that might be New Jersey’s subsequent huge public corruption scandal. We’ll additionally take a look at actual property dramas enjoying out at two theaters.
The septuagenarian profession legal is George Bratsenis, whose lengthy odyssey on the fallacious aspect of the regulation contains robberies and burglaries with a man often known as Set off Lou; the killing of a drug courier often known as the Turk; and ties to organized crime. However is he successful man?
That query could also be answered in the present day. He’s scheduled to look in federal courtroom in New Jersey to enter a plea in a murder-for-hire case. My colleague Ed Shanahan, who has sifted via courtroom paperwork and different public information, says it’s a new chapter for Bratsenis, who as soon as took orders from Gambino crime household associates. I requested Ed to place the most recent case in context.
Why are we listening to about Bratsenis now?
In January, a veteran political marketing campaign marketing consultant named Sean Caddle pleaded responsible to arranging the killing of an affiliate in 2014. Caddle mentioned Bratsenis had been the first hit man. Caddle mentioned he paid Bratsenis 1000’s of {dollars} in money upfront and the stability within the car parking zone of a diner in Elizabeth, N.J., on the day after the homicide.
You wrote that Bratsenis was an “old-school hoodlum” whose legal heyday ran from the mid-Seventies to the mid-Nineteen Eighties.
Sure. From 1974 to 1985, he racked up 10 convictions — lots of them for felonies like housebreaking, armed theft and, in a single occasion, conspiracy to commit homicide. Many of the instances have been in Connecticut, in or inside a simple drive of his hometown, Stamford. However he additionally ventured to Florida (the place he was charged with grand theft), Nova Scotia (the place he robbed a bowling alley at gunpoint for $700) and New Jersey.
One factor I discovered in reporting all this was what a cesspool of organized crime and authorities corruption Stamford was within the Seventies and into the ’80s. It was fertile floor for somebody like Bratsenis, who, as one retired Stamford officer put it, “would do something for rent.” Capt. Richard Conklin of the Stamford police advised me that Bratsenis and his crew “would hyperlink up with organized crime associates” — mainly these tied to the Gambino household — “and do their bidding: robberies, burglaries, promoting medication.”
Courtroom information present that his main accomplice was a man named Louis Sclafani, who referred to as himself Set off Lou and who finally betrayed Bratsenis, testifying in opposition to him as a federally protected witness in a number of instances.
Among the many most critical crimes Bratsenis and Sclafani have been charged in was the killing of a drug courier named David Avnayim, a.ok.a. the Turk. Prosecutors mentioned he was killed in 1980 on the path of Larry Hogan, a retired Stamford police lieutenant who employed Bratsenis as “muscle” and who was infamous in southeast Connecticut on the time due to suspicions that he was near the Gambinos and concerned within the drug commerce.
Hogan was additionally charged however died earlier than trial. Sclafani cooperated. Bratsenis pleaded responsible to homicide conspiracy. Once I reached David Golub, a lawyer who represented Hogan, to ask about Bratsenis, he mentioned: “If he’s out of jail greater than a day, it’s a fluke.”
A short time later, he hatched a weird scheme to interrupt out of jail. What was that every one about?
He was arrested and charged in 1983 in a jewellery retailer heist in Little Falls, N.J. Whereas he was in jail awaiting trial, one among his sisters smuggled in a balloon crammed with the nausea-inducing drug Antabuse that — unusual however true — he saved in his rectum for weeks.
He deliberate to ingest the drug the day the trial began, make himself violently ailing and immediate a visit to a hospital, the place armed males can be ready to spring him, in response to a retired investigator from the Passaic County prosecutor’s workplace.
The plot was foiled with the assistance of a jailhouse informer and an spy who recorded Bratsenis’s sister discussing it.
What’s subsequent for Bratsenis?
Other than the courtroom look in New Jersey in the present day, he has been in federal custody since September 2014 — about 5 months after the killing of Galdieri — as a result of he was arrested and charged in a financial institution theft in Trumbull, Conn. He pleaded responsible in that case three years in the past and has been awaiting sentencing ever since.
Climate
Put together for temps within the low 50s, with rain, thunderstorms and wind gusts throughout the day. Late at night time, the rain continues as temps stay regular within the 50s.
alternate-side parking
In impact till April 14 (Holy Thursday).
Trump investigator cites ‘quite a few felony violations’
One of many Manhattan prosecutors who investigated Donald Trump believed that the previous president was “responsible of quite a few felony violations,” in response to a duplicate of his resignation letter. The prosecutor, Mark Pomerantz, stop final month after the brand new district lawyer, Alvin Bragg, abruptly stopped pursuing an indictment. Pomerantz wrote within the resignation letter that not holding Trump accountable was “a grave failure of justice.”
The newest New York information
The Covid-19 vaccine
Different huge tales
2 theaters, 2 actual property offers
Is New York the one place the place there’s drama in actual property offers about theaters?
One new theater deal includes Problem Undertaking Room, a efficiency nonprofit that emphasizes work by experimental artists, and which has been the tenant in a 5,000-square-foot theater house in Downtown Brooklyn. Now it’s the proprietor.
Zev Greenfield, the manager director and chief curator of Problem Undertaking Room, mentioned the deed had been transferred as a donation by Two Bushes Administration, the developer that transformed the remainder of the constructing to condominiums. Two Bushes purchased the constructing, the previous Board of Schooling headquarters, from the town in 2003.
Greenfield referred to as the theater “a jewel” and mentioned possession was one thing to have a good time. However Problem Undertaking Room can’t have a good time on the premises proper now. The theater, at 22 Boerum Place, is closed for renovations which might be underway with allocations totaling $9 million from the town.
One other theater deal includes the Metro, an Artwork Deco film home on Broadway between West 99th and a centesimal Streets. It has been closed since late 2005.
The proprietor, Albert Bialek, mentioned he had signed a lease with an operator that deliberate to showcase impartial movies. He wouldn’t identify the operator however mentioned the plan was for a multiscreen home “with full restaurant services, occasion house for conferences and that form of factor.”
Mark Levine, the Manhattan borough president, mentioned he had spoken with the pinnacle of the corporate that had signed the lease. Like Bialek, he wouldn’t identify the corporate. “The important thing factor is he truly signed the lease,” he mentioned. “That’s a threshold that’s by no means been crossed earlier than within the many near-misses that we’ve needed to wrestle via during the last 15 years.”
What we’re studying
METROPOLITAN diary
Strangers No Extra
To mark two years (and extra) of Covid-19, Metropolitan Diary this week options reader tales of life in New York Metropolis throughout the pandemic.
Pricey Diary:
I stepped into a big, empty elevator in Midtown on my approach to a health care provider’s appointment.
Because the doorways have been closing, one girl, after which one other, rushed towards the elevator. I held the doorways, and the three of us, masked and standing six toes aside, nodded to at least one one other.
There was a mirror within the elevator. I turned and obtained a take a look at my reflection.
“Oh, God,” I blurted out. “My hair is so terrible!” (I had not coloured it in 19 months and had reduce it solely as soon as in that point.)
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New York
Senator Menendez’s Resignation Letter
![Senator Menendez’s Resignation Letter Senator Menendez’s Resignation Letter](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/07/23/doc-4ddf28bf-7055-4adb-bc76-b-promo/doc-4ddf28bf-7055-4adb-bc76-b-promo-facebookJumbo.png)
ROBERT MENENDEZ
NEW JERSEY
COMMITTEES:
BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN
AFFAIRS
FINANCE
FOREIGN RELATIONS
The Honorable Phil Murphy
Governor of New Jersey
Office of the Governor
Trenton, N.J. 08625
Dear Governor Murphy,
United States Senate
WASHINGTON, DC 20510-3005
July 23, 2024
528 SENATE HART OFFICE BUILDING
WASHINGTON, DC 20510
(202) 224-4744
210 HUDSON STREET
HARBORSIDE 3, SUITE #1000
JERSEY CITY, NJ 07311
(973) 645-3030
208 WHITE HORSE PIKE
SUITE 18-19
BARRINGTON, NJ 08007
(856) 757-5353
This is to advise you that I will be resigning from my office as the United States Senator from
New Jersey, effective on the close of business on August 20, 2024.
This will give time for my staff to transition to other possibilities, transfer constituent files that
are pending, allow for an orderly process to choose an interim replacement, and for me to close
out my Senate affairs.
While I fully intend to appeal the jury’s verdict, all the way and including to the Supreme Court,
I do not want the Senate to be involved in a lengthy process that will detract from its important
work. Furthermore, I cannot preserve my rights upon a successful appeal, because factual matters
before the ethics committee are not privileged. This is evidenced by the Committee’s Staff
Director and Chief Counsel being called to testify at my trial.
I am proud of the many accomplishments I’ve had on behalf of New Jersey, such as leading the
federal effort for Superstorm Sandy recovery, preserving and funding Gateway and leading the
federal efforts to help save our hospitals, State and municipalities, as well as New Jersey families
through a once in a century COVID pandemic. These successes led you, Governor, to call me the
“Indispensable Senator.”
I thank the citizens of New Jersey for the extraordinary privilege of representing them in the
United States Senate.
Sincerely,
Pabet Menang.
Robert Menendez
United States Senator
New Jersey
cc: The Honorable Kamala Harris, President of the Senate
The Honorable Ann Berry, Secretary of the Senate
New York
How Well Do You Know Literary Brooklyn?
![How Well Do You Know Literary Brooklyn? How Well Do You Know Literary Brooklyn?](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/07/22/books/review/22Quiz-Brooklyn/22Quiz-Brooklyn-facebookJumbo.jpg)
A strong sense of place can deeply influence a story, and in some cases, the setting can even feel like a character itself. This week’s literary geography quiz celebrates Brooklyn and novels set around the bustling borough. To play, just make your selection in the multiple-choice list and the correct answer will be revealed. Links to the books will be listed at the end of the quiz if you’d like to do further reading.
New York
See How Your Subway Service May Suffer Without Congestion Pricing
![See How Your Subway Service May Suffer Without Congestion Pricing See How Your Subway Service May Suffer Without Congestion Pricing](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/07/10/multimedia/2024-06-28-subway-projects-index/2024-06-28-subway-projects-index-facebookJumbo-v4.png)
After Gov. Kathy Hochul halted New York City’s congestion pricing program last month, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority cut $16.5 billion worth of planned upgrades to the city’s vast transit network, mostly to account for the loss of funding that was tied to revenue from the toll.
Source: Metropolitan Transportation Authority
Notes: The chart shows the $28.5 billion in uncommitted funds in the M.T.A.’s 2020-24 capital program; an additional $27 billion had already been committed.
The impact of the congestion pricing suspension on the M.T.A.’s funds for capital projects
Projects were cut from each part of New York City’s transit system, which is the largest in North America and is used by millions of people every day. The projects included elevator and ramp installations that would make subway stations accessible for people with disabilities, structural repairs to aging infrastructure and upgrades to 1930s-era signals that regularly cause delays.
Here are some of the subway projects the authority says it has shelved:
The cuts announced by the M.T.A. — the state agency that runs the subway, bus and commuter rail lines — will also affect transit outside the subway system. The authority has postponed the purchase of more than 250 electric buses and charging infrastructure at bus depots, as well as upgrades to regional rails and a ramp reconstruction on the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.
The $12 billion remaining in the M.T.A.’s capital funds will be spent on projects the authority considers the most urgent, like track replacements and repairs to power substations. It will also replace some of the “least reliable” subway and railway cars, the authority said in a report.
All told, there are 92 subway stations that will not get planned improvements, including 22 stations that will not get new elevators or ramps; 10 that will not get upgrades like structural repairs, platform replacements and new barriers between platforms and tracks; and 71 that will not get upgrades to their public announcement systems.
Below is a list of the subway stations where upgrades have been put on hold, based on what the M.T.A. has detailed so far:
Projects on hold at 41 stations in Brooklyn:
Union St R
- upgrade to public announcement system
4 Av-9 St R
- upgrade to public announcement system
36 St D N R
- upgrade to public announcement system
59 St N R
- upgrade to public announcement system
Bergen St F G
- upgrade to public announcement system
15 St-Prospect Park F G
- upgrade to public announcement system
Church Av F G
- upgrade to public announcement system
Avenue X F
- upgrade to public announcement system
Neptune Av F
- upgrade to public announcement system
- elevator or ramp installation
- platform or waiting area replacement
Jay St-MetroTech A C F
- upgrade to public announcement system
Hoyt-Schermerhorn Sts A C G
- upgrade to public announcement system
- elevator or ramp installation
Franklin Av C
- upgrade to public announcement system
Nostrand Av A C
- upgrade to public announcement system
- elevator or ramp installation
Utica Av A C
- upgrade to public announcement system
Euclid Av A C
- upgrade to public announcement system
7 Av B Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
Kings Hwy B Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
Avenue U Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
Neck Rd Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
Sheepshead Bay B Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
Brighton Beach B Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
Ocean Pkwy Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
W 8 St-NY Aquarium F Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
Jefferson St L
- elevator or ramp installation
Nevins St 2 3 4 5
- platform or waiting area replacement
Crescent St J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Norwood Av J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Cleveland St J
- upgrade to public announcement system
Van Siclen Av J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Alabama Av J
- upgrade to public announcement system
Chauncey St J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Halsey St J
- upgrade to public announcement system
Gates Av J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Kosciuszko St J
- upgrade to public announcement system
Myrtle Av J M Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Flushing Av J M
- upgrade to public announcement system
Lorimer St J M
- upgrade to public announcement system
Hewes St J M
- upgrade to public announcement system
Marcy Av J M Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Kings Hwy N
- elevator or ramp installation
18 Av D
- elevator or ramp installation
Projects on hold at 9 stations in the Bronx:
Norwood-205 St D
- upgrade to public announcement system
Bedford Park Blvd B D
- upgrade to public announcement system
Kingsbridge Rd B D
- upgrade to public announcement system
Fordham Rd B D
- upgrade to public announcement system
Tremont Av B D
- upgrade to public announcement system
161 St-Yankee Stadium B D
- upgrade to public announcement system
Wakefield-241 St 2
- elevator or ramp installation
Brook Av 6
- elevator or ramp installation
- repairs for structural or aesthetic issues
3 Av-138 St 6
- elevator or ramp installation
- repairs for structural or aesthetic issues
Projects on hold at 27 stations in Manhattan:
Roosevelt Island F
- upgrade to public announcement system
Lexington Av/63 St F Q
- upgrade to public announcement system
47-50 Sts-Rockefeller Ctr B D F M
- upgrade to public announcement system
42 St-Bryant Pk B D F M
- upgrade to public announcement system
- elevator or ramp installation
34 St-Herald Sq B D F M
- upgrade to public announcement system
Broadway-Lafayette St B D F M
- upgrade to public announcement system
2 Av F
- upgrade to public announcement system
Delancey St-Essex St F
- upgrade to public announcement system
- elevator or ramp installation
East Broadway F
- upgrade to public announcement system
190 St A
- repairs for structural or aesthetic issues
145 St A C B D
- elevator or ramp installation
W 4 St-Wash Sq A C E
- upgrade to public announcement system
Canal St A C E
- upgrade to public announcement system
Chambers St A C
- upgrade to public announcement system
World Trade Center E
- upgrade to public announcement system
Lexington Av/59 St N R W
- elevator or ramp installation
168 St 1
- elevator or ramp installation
3 Av L
- new fencing between platform and track
5 Av 7
- elevator or ramp installation
Times Sq-42 St 7
- new fencing between platform and track
Delancey St-Essex St J M Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
- elevator or ramp installation
Canal St J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Chambers St J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
- repairs for structural or aesthetic issues
Broad St J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
110 St 6
- elevator or ramp installation
59 St 4 5 6
- elevator or ramp installation
7 Av B D E
- elevator or ramp installation
Projects on hold at 14 stations in Queens:
21 St-Queensbridge F
- upgrade to public announcement system
111 St J
- upgrade to public announcement system
75 St-Elderts Ln J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Ozone Park-Lefferts Blvd A
- upgrade to public announcement system
Jamaica Center-Parsons/Archer E J Z
- upgrade to public announcement system
Sutphin Blvd-Archer Av-JFK Airport E J Z
- new fencing between platform and track
Jamaica-Van Wyck E
- upgrade to public announcement system
Parsons Blvd F
- elevator or ramp installation
Sutphin Blvd F
- upgrade to public announcement system
Briarwood E F
- elevator or ramp installation
- repairs for structural or aesthetic issues
Howard Beach-JFK Airport A
- upgrade to public announcement system
Broad Channel A S
- upgrade to public announcement system
Far Rockaway-Mott Av A
- upgrade to public announcement system
Rockaway Park-Beach 116 St A S
- upgrade to public announcement system
Projects on hold at 1 station in Staten Island:
Clifton SIR
- elevator or ramp installation
-
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