The Palm Beach Post from West Palm Beach, Florida • Page 22

Section Tuesday, September 11, 2001 Boca council questions plan for pricey flyover PAGE 4B BankAtlantic to buy Savings BUSINESS, 8B 1 1 The Palm Beach Post PalmBeachPost.com LOCAL NEWS brmer sheriff recollects role in Hoffa probe Jllllllllll I -II IUJWIJI1 i rf IMnnPafJ the time of Hoffa's Investigators and Bv Claw I amhort Tn fart Neumann said, he is the one biographers have guessed that Hoffa was killed by alleged mobsters Tony Gia-calone and Tony Provenzano or their associates. But family members said Hoffa 'wouldn't have left the Machus Red Fox restaurant unless a trust rant at disappearance. "Look, nobody ever said organized crime figures were rocket scientists, but they aren't this stupid," Burdick said. "You get a noted loudmouth and someone who owes Hoffa everything and you let him borrow your 18-year-old son's car and convince him to kill the biggest labor boss in America. Oh, then he leaves the gun in the car.

"Come on, this is a plan?" Burdick said. Neumann is unfazed by the criticism. "Mr. Burdick is entitled to his opinion," Neumann said. "He said something like that 26 years ago, too.

But who's to say what makes sense and what doesn't?" cla ylambertpbpost.com Neumann said Monday from his Tallahassee office. "I followed the whole cast of characters." O'Brien, 66, lives in a townhouse in the L'Ambiance subdivision west of Boca Raton. He was recently re-interviewed by FBI agents still probing his connection to Hoffa's disappearance. Neumann is now the insurance fraud director for the Florida insurance commissioner after serving one term as Palm Beach County sheriff. But he was the FBI agent on duty in suburban Detroit on July 31, 1975 the day after Hoffa's disappearance.

"I took the first call," he said. "From then on, the next 66 years of my life were pretty much spent investigating the case." who went to the Hoffa home looking for hair samples to compare with a hair found in a Mercury Marquis Brougham O'Brien borrowed from the son of a reputed mob boss that day. The hair proved significant years later. Last week word leaked from the FBI that DNA testing proved Hoffa's hair matched another strand found in the car. The news didn't shock Neumann.

"Mr. O'Brien was certainly a suspect in the case; I don't think that is any secret," he said. The man who represented O'Brien in the 1970s said the FBI's theory never made sense. James Burdick still practices law in the Detroit area. Pjafri beach Post Stag Writer i Charles O'Brien left much of the foama of Jimmy Hoffa's disappearance behind when he traded the snow of Detroit for the sunshine of southern Palm lach County.

But one of his principal iursuers was never far away and he had his eye on the man everyone knew as Chuckie. FBI Special Agent Robert W. Neumann had become Palm Beach County Sheriff Neumann and this summer became the state's top' insurance fraud investigator, but the lawman never lost sight of a colorful figure some believe lured the nation's top labor boss to his (jfjattf. knew Mr, O'Brien was there," Neumann ed friend lured him. And they guessed that friend might have been O'Brien.

O'Brien's own Lincoln Continental had been repossessed. He borrowed the car where the hair was found from Gia-calone's son and said he was delivering a fish in the neighborhood of the restau- agnet study not enough for board I ft I '-v- Vv I -J-" inmra.fi i wnnill- im ir BRUCE R. BENNETTStaff Photographer Student achievement rates and program successes couldn't be garnered from a study of the county's magnet schools. By Mary Ellen Flannery Palm Beach Post Staff Writer School board members had about 17 minutes Monday afternoon to consider the future of magnet schools in Palm Beach County it certainly wasn't enough time. "We keep making decisions piecemeal.

We're talking about magnets today and something else tomorrow," complained school board member Jody Gleason. "We need to break down and have a retreat to discuss the big picture." Noted, said Schools Superintendent Art Johnson. School board members met Monday to talk about the magnet study, which was released in mid-August by former school board member Arthur Anderson of TRA Associates Inc. School board members are supposed to use the results to help determine the magnets' fate, but they said Monday the study didn't give them all the necessary information. "I'd be reluctant to make any decisions based on this information," Gleason said.

Next year, magnet schools face a 25 percent budget cut by Johnson, and some might be eliminated altogether. Johnson asked school board members Monday to tell him what the purpose of the magnets should be, and how much money they want to spend on the schools. According to TRA's study, which cost $38,000, magnet programs at just 11 of 29 schools are meeting racial diversity goals, often because their boundaries make it difficult for students outside their neighborhoods to attend. Most are also failing to improve academic achievement Anderson found test scores at magnet schools went up and down, but didn't differ much from the district average. School board members said Monday they're most concerned with academic achievement "That's the bottom line," said board member Debra Robinson.

But school board member Sandra Rich- Otter enjoyment the Palm Beach Zoo at Dreher Park. Khaiid recently visited with his parents, Debra and Ed, and sister, Mary. WEST PALM BEACH Khaiid Carter, 5, of Riviera Beach tries to generate some attention from within the otter pool, a longtime popular attraction at female prosecutors not sent to Berman's court who were "young, female and attractive to hearincr on allegations the judge sexually ha Rumors influenced assignments Berman's court "The perception was that Judge Berman frequently would express personal interest in attorneys that fell into that category, and that the personal interest may at times influence the way he handled cases," Selvig said in his sworn statement. The perception was based more on rumor than specific instances, Selvig acknowledged. Mike Edmondson, a spokesman for Krischer, said he was not familiar with Selvig Please see BERMAN, 2B rassed four women.

Berman, 50, avoided a trial before the commission by announcing Friday that he was retiring from the bench. He has denied harassing the women. An attorney for Berman argued in court papers filed this month that Selvig's statements and similar statements from Assistant State Attorney Ted Booras were "worse than hearsay." Attorney Sidney Stubbs said neither knew of specific complaints against Berman. Selvig, who was in charge of assigning prosecutors to judges' courtrooms from 1993 to 1997, said he would try not to assign lawyers By Bill Douthat Palm Beach Post Staff Writer The state attorney's office tried to avoid assigning attractive female prosecutors to Circuit Judge Howard Berman's court because of rumors of the judge's fawning over women, according to documents released Monday. "Generally speaking, we would try not to assign attorneys who fit in that category to his division," said Kenneth Selvig, a top assistant to State Attorney Barry Krischer, in testimony taken for a Judicial Qualifications Commission -) ii tin Berman: Quit he bench.

hopes slide adds (County to Lake Lytal pool plash ii- A I -f 'Down here, we're competing with 40 miles of coastline. DAVE LILL Park aquatics director Please see MAGNETS, 2B Sisterhood made in Boynton with Chinese city link By Alice Gregory Palm Beach Post Staff Writer BOYNTON BEACH With a signature, a handshake and an exchange of gifts, a friendship that stretches halfway around the world became formal Monday. Delegates from Qufu, China, a city 350 miles southeast of Beijing in the coastal Shandong province, made their sister city relationship with Boynton Beach official at a welcoming ceremony. In gracious fashion, the Chinese city officials, led by Qufu Vice Mayor Liu Zhi Feng, traded gifts with Boynton Beach city leaders. The delegation received city golf shirts (though some joked that they should have gotten the popular city boxer shorts), while Boynton Beach commissioners received gift bags of Confucius souvenirs.

Qufu (pronounced shoo-foo) is famous for being the birthplace of Confucius. About 15 residents and business leaders witnessed the event, and later took pictures and shook hands with Liu Zhi Feng and his Please see SISTER CITIES, 2B By MarcCaputo Point Reach Post Staff Writer three-chute, water slide is set to make a splashdown at Lake Lytal Park; County commissioners today are $et tJ earmark nearly $430,000 to pay for the new water slide and a host of filter system upgrades at the suburban West Palm Beach pool. I With attendance slipping at Lake Lytal and other no-frills swimming pools, parks officials say the mean- dering, 150-foot-long slide is a must here, we're competing with 40 miles of coastline," said park Atmatics Director Dave Lill. "We have to offer kids and families something they can't get at the beach." Slides seem to be the way to do that. People have been flocking to Palm Beach County's two new water parks.

From March to August, Calypso Bay Waterpark in Royal Palm Beach and Coconut Cove Waterpark in suburban Boca Raton each saw more than 100,000 visitors. Lake Lytal doesn't attract that many in an entire year. The slide won't be the only new feature at Lake Lytal Park. The South Florida Science Museum plans to move from West Palm Beach to 11.2 acres at the park for little or no cost To bring the 20-year-old Lake Lytal Park into the 21st century, the county has overhauled the wading pool, expanded the deck area and shaded its chaise lounges with large umbrellas, said County Parks Director Dennis Eshleman. After work on the $250,000 slide and the pump and filtration system are completed by year's end, the county will have spent about $1.2 million fixing up Lake Lytal.

People using the slide won't end BRUCE R. BENNETTStaff Photographer Preparing for the holidays WEST PALM BEACH Volunteers such as Rose Gould (upper right) help assemble meals Monday for Morse Geriatric Center's Homebound Mitzvah Program. The volunteers prepared and froze more than 1,000 kosher meals for those in need during the upcoming High Holidays. Heasesee LAKE LYTAL, 2B.