cuomo studies felons while murderously denying the nassau otb faithful their tights secured by ny const art 1 sec 3
death to the orthodox church cries cuomo the king
let ted out of florence to study and teach mathematics
Claude Solnik
Long Island Business News
2150 Smithtown Ave.
Ronkonkoma, NY 11779-7348
Home > LI Confidential > Stop scratching on holidays
Stop scratching on holidays
Published: June 1, 2012
Off Track Betting in New York State has been racing into a crisis called shrinking revenue. Some people have spitballed a solution: Don’t close on holidays.
New York State Racing Law bars racing on Christmas, Easter and Palm Sunday, and the state has ruled OTBs can’t handle action on those days, even though they could easily broadcast races from out of state.
“You should be able to bet whenever you want,” said Jackson Leeds, a Nassau OTB employee who makes an occasional bet. He added some irrefutable logic: “How is the business going to make money if you’re not open to take people’s bets?”
Elias Tsekerides, president of the Federation of Hellenic Societies of Greater New York, said OTB is open on Greek Orthodox Easter and Palm Sunday.
“I don’t want discrimination,” Tsekerides said. “They close for the Catholics, but open for the Greek Orthodox? It’s either open for all or not open.”
OTB officials have said they lose millions by closing on Palm Sunday alone, with tracks such as Gulfstream, Santa Anita, Turf Paradise and Hawthorne running.
One option: OTBs could just stay open and face the consequences. New York City OTB did just that back in 2003. The handle was about $1.5 million – and OTB was fined $5,000.
Easy money.
Judith Clark, who as a young woman was part of a violent left-wing movement and participated in a fatal botched robbery of a Brink’s armored car in 1981 in Rockland County, N.Y., was denied parole on Friday despite the support of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who ordered her sentence commuted late last year.
Ms. Clark has served 35 years of a minimum 75-year sentence for her role in the notorious crime, which left a guard and two police officers dead and was one of the final acts of rage of a waning movement. She will not be eligible for parole again until April 2019.
The decision not to release Ms. Clark, 67, from prison was something of a blow for Mr. Cuomo, who took the politically risky decision to commute her sentence, making her eligible for parole, saying that she had made “exceptional strides in self-development.”
Speaking at the funeral of the former Daily News columnist Jimmy Breslin in March, he went further.
“It was a hard political decision,” Mr. Cuomo said. “I could hear Jimmy’s voice saying, ‘She made a mistake — we all do. She learned, she paid the price, she spent her life in a cage, and she is now different. Jesus would pardon her. Who the hell made you better than Jesus?’”
ADVERTISEMENT
On Friday evening, aides to Mr. Cuomo said that while he was impressed with her rehabilitation, he could have chosen to commute her sentence in such a way that she would immediately have been released. Instead, he chose to simply make her eligible for parole.
“Judith Clark deserved the opportunity to make her case for parole based on her extensive prison programming, her perfect disciplinary record while incarcerated, and impressive self-development over the past 35 years,” said Dani Lever, a spokeswoman for the governor. “The commutation afforded her that opportunity and we respect the parole board’s decision.”
The three members of the board voted unanimously against parole; only one of them was a Cuomo appointee.
In announcing the decision, the board said its members “respect and understand the governor’s lawful decision to exercise his unique discretion in your case.”
It stressed, however, that it was an independent body and that its decision was based on “substantial additional information that was created and submitted pursuant to our unique process.”
While parole board hearings are not public and transcripts are not yet available, a summary explaining their decision was released late Friday.
It focused on the unique nature of her case and the message her release would send to law enforcement. “We do find that your release at this time is incompatible with the welfare of society as expressed by relevant officials and thousands of its members,” the board wrote. “You are still a symbol of a terroristic crime.”
Ms. Clark’s case became something of a Rorschach test for how people view punishment for a crime, and it sparked a debate about rehabilitation.
Law enforcement groups have steadfastly opposed Ms. Clark’s release, and last month, Republican state senators gave the parole board a petition, which they said contained 10,000 signatures, urging that she be kept in prison.
Some relatives of those killed also opposed her parole, expressing deep disappointment with Mr. Cuomo’s decision.
A groundswell of support for Ms. Clark began even before her sentence was commuted.
Last year, 13 former presidents of the New York City Bar Association signed a letter seeking clemency; so have prison officials who have worked with Ms. Clark during her incarceration, most of which she has spent at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women in Westchester County.
Ms. Clark has said it was not until she was locked away that she came to know herself.
Her radicalization had started young.
She was just 14 when she began to delve deeply into politics, gravitating to the Weather Underground and an even more radical offshoot, the May 19th Communist Organization. The group attached itself to a revolutionary black organization, and together they hoped to plant the seeds for a guerrilla uprising. But the revolution would need to be financed.
So the group hatched a plan to steal $1.6 million from a Brink’s armored car.
Ms. Clark, in an interview with Tom Robbins in The New York Times Magazine in 2012, described what happened.
She said that as a new mother, she was nervous about the plot, but she agreed to be the getaway driver, fully aware of what she was doing. As she sat in a car in a parking lot of a mall in Nanuet, her associates approached the Brink’s van. Gunfire erupted. One guard was killed; another was left in a pool of blood.
Her associates grabbed the cash, hopped in a van and fled. Ms. Clark followed in the car she was driving. At a nearby parking lot, six gunmen abandoned the van and piled into the back of a U-Haul.
Someone threw the cash into the back of Ms. Clark’s car, and the caravan set off. The police, however, had set up a roadblock at a nearby entrance to the New York State Thruway.
The U-Haul was flagged and pulled over by the police. Ms. Clark heard gunfire; then two of her associates jumped into the car. She sped away, but it was not long before the police caught up, and soon she was in custody.
The gang had killed three people: the Brink’s security guard, Peter Paige; and two Nyack police officers, Sgt. Edward O’Grady and Officer Waverly Brown.
At the time of her trial, Ms. Clark was still inflamed by her beliefs, and she represented herself. She expressed no remorse, telling the jury that revolutionary violence was a “liberating force.”
Her behavior helps explain her long sentence.
Her supporters argued that even though she never pulled a trigger, her sentence was much harsher than those of many of the others involved.
Steve Zeidman, Ms. Clark’s lawyer, said that the parole board’s decision ignores “Ms. Clark’s extraordinary record of achievement and transformation and instead elevates calls for interminable punishment.”
Ms. Clark’s daughter, Harriet, said she understood the seriousness of the crime but believed the decision by the board was an injustice. “My mother did not kill anyone, and it’s hard for me to understand who is served by making her die in prison, which is what decisions like this eventually amount to,” she said.
But others, especially those who were personally affected, felt differently.
A former Nyack detective, Arthur Keenan, who offered over an hour of testimony to the parole board arguing against her release, said he was informed shortly after 5 p.m. Friday that Ms. Clark had been denied parole.
“I am very pleased with their decision,” he said.
Judith Clark, who as a young woman was part of a violent left-wing movement and participated in a fatal botched robbery of a Brink’s armored car in 1981 in Rockland County, N.Y., was denied parole on Friday despite the support of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who ordered her sentence commuted late last year.
Ms. Clark has served 35 years of a minimum 75-year sentence for her role in the notorious crime, which left a guard and two police officers dead and was one of the final acts of rage of a waning movement. She will not be eligible for parole again until April 2019.
The decision not to release Ms. Clark, 67, from prison was something of a blow for Mr. Cuomo, who took the politically risky decision to commute her sentence, making her eligible for parole, saying that she had made “exceptional strides in self-development.”
Speaking at the funeral of the former Daily News columnist Jimmy Breslin in March, he went further.
“It was a hard political decision,” Mr. Cuomo said. “I could hear Jimmy’s voice saying, ‘She made a mistake — we all do. She learned, she paid the price, she spent her life in a cage, and she is now different. Jesus would pardon her. Who the hell made you better than Jesus?’”
ADVERTISEMENT
On Friday evening, aides to Mr. Cuomo said that while he was impressed with her rehabilitation, he could have chosen to commute her sentence in such a way that she would immediately have been released. Instead, he chose to simply make her eligible for parole.
“Judith Clark deserved the opportunity to make her case for parole based on her extensive prison programming, her perfect disciplinary record while incarcerated, and impressive self-development over the past 35 years,” said Dani Lever, a spokeswoman for the governor. “The commutation afforded her that opportunity and we respect the parole board’s decision.”
The three members of the board voted unanimously against parole; only one of them was a Cuomo appointee.
In announcing the decision, the board said its members “respect and understand the governor’s lawful decision to exercise his unique discretion in your case.”
It stressed, however, that it was an independent body and that its decision was based on “substantial additional information that was created and submitted pursuant to our unique process.”
While parole board hearings are not public and transcripts are not yet available, a summary explaining their decision was released late Friday.
It focused on the unique nature of her case and the message her release would send to law enforcement. “We do find that your release at this time is incompatible with the welfare of society as expressed by relevant officials and thousands of its members,” the board wrote. “You are still a symbol of a terroristic crime.”
Ms. Clark’s case became something of a Rorschach test for how people view punishment for a crime, and it sparked a debate about rehabilitation.
Law enforcement groups have steadfastly opposed Ms. Clark’s release, and last month, Republican state senators gave the parole board a petition, which they said contained 10,000 signatures, urging that she be kept in prison.
Some relatives of those killed also opposed her parole, expressing deep disappointment with Mr. Cuomo’s decision.
A groundswell of support for Ms. Clark began even before her sentence was commuted.
Last year, 13 former presidents of the New York City Bar Association signed a letter seeking clemency; so have prison officials who have worked with Ms. Clark during her incarceration, most of which she has spent at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women in Westchester County.
Ms. Clark has said it was not until she was locked away that she came to know herself.
Her radicalization had started young.
She was just 14 when she began to delve deeply into politics, gravitating to the Weather Underground and an even more radical offshoot, the May 19th Communist Organization. The group attached itself to a revolutionary black organization, and together they hoped to plant the seeds for a guerrilla uprising. But the revolution would need to be financed.
So the group hatched a plan to steal $1.6 million from a Brink’s armored car.
Ms. Clark, in an interview with Tom Robbins in The New York Times Magazine in 2012, described what happened.
She said that as a new mother, she was nervous about the plot, but she agreed to be the getaway driver, fully aware of what she was doing. As she sat in a car in a parking lot of a mall in Nanuet, her associates approached the Brink’s van. Gunfire erupted. One guard was killed; another was left in a pool of blood.
Her associates grabbed the cash, hopped in a van and fled. Ms. Clark followed in the car she was driving. At a nearby parking lot, six gunmen abandoned the van and piled into the back of a U-Haul.
Someone threw the cash into the back of Ms. Clark’s car, and the caravan set off. The police, however, had set up a roadblock at a nearby entrance to the New York State Thruway.
The U-Haul was flagged and pulled over by the police. Ms. Clark heard gunfire; then two of her associates jumped into the car. She sped away, but it was not long before the police caught up, and soon she was in custody.
The gang had killed three people: the Brink’s security guard, Peter Paige; and two Nyack police officers, Sgt. Edward O’Grady and Officer Waverly Brown.
At the time of her trial, Ms. Clark was still inflamed by her beliefs, and she represented herself. She expressed no remorse, telling the jury that revolutionary violence was a “liberating force.”
Her behavior helps explain her long sentence.
Her supporters argued that even though she never pulled a trigger, her sentence was much harsher than those of many of the others involved.
Steve Zeidman, Ms. Clark’s lawyer, said that the parole board’s decision ignores “Ms. Clark’s extraordinary record of achievement and transformation and instead elevates calls for interminable punishment.”
Ms. Clark’s daughter, Harriet, said she understood the seriousness of the crime but believed the decision by the board was an injustice. “My mother did not kill anyone, and it’s hard for me to understand who is served by making her die in prison, which is what decisions like this eventually amount to,” she said.
But others, especially those who were personally affected, felt differently.
A former Nyack detective, Arthur Keenan, who offered over an hour of testimony to the parole board arguing against her release, said he was informed shortly after 5 p.m. Friday that Ms. Clark had been denied parole.
“I am very pleased with their decision,” he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment