The Courier-News from Bridgewater, New Jersey • Page 3

I I I fz if rri Courier News I Jf I Vj A-3 MONDAY, MARCH 15, 2004 Ex-hostage: Union Twp. captor was 'manic' Receptionist at limousine service says man stripped down to underwear, wanted to meet 'Sopranos' stars. ing which she thought she was going to die. "I can't sleep. Every time I close my eyes, I still see his face," she said.

Walsh said Pintado came into the office looking for a job he had applied for a week earlier. When Walsh told him owner Dominick Glynn would not be in until the afternoon, Pintado went out to his car and returned saying he said envelopes containing anthrax, a snot-gun and a bomb in his briefcase. During the standoff, Walsh said, Pintado paced around in his underwear and asked to meet three cast members of "The Sopranos" because he wanted to break into acting. She described Pintado's behavior as "manic" and "paranoid." Umon County Prosecutor Theodore Romankow said Pintado suffers from bipolar disorder and had not taken his medication. He said if Pintado is cleared to stand trial, he could face charges including kidnapping, making terroristic threats, assault on a police officer and resisting arrest.

Elio Pintado, 30, also ranted about people who were "out to get him." She said he forced her to strip to her underwear and used her as a human shield. Walsh and a second hostage, limousine driver Christopher Castillo, did not suffer any physical injuries during the standoff. However, Walsh said she is haunted by the ordeal, dur By The Associated Press ROSELLE PARK A woman held hostage for 1 0 hours by a Union Township man Friday said her captor claimed to have a bomb and en velopes containing anthrax and made demands that included meeting cast members of 'The Sopranos." Courtney Walsh, 25, of Linden, a receptionist at DJ's Limousine Service, said bit ufdit rail eetDi sailing on first daw of peraiii -i 1 1 i i '1 iZJZT II-. .1 1 1 1 1 i III 1 1 Ml 1 1 1 Malpractice insurance on deck for Assembly By KATHY HENNESSY The Associated Press TRENTON Lawmakers are set to vote today on a legislative remedy to hold down escalating medical malpractice insurance costs that have prompted some doctors to threaten to leave New Jersey. After the bill was stalled in the Assembly for a year, lawmakers have tweaked it and say it will now provide financial help to physicians while maintaining the legal rights of malpractice victims who want to sue for damages.

"The bottom line is, doctors will get the relief they deserve, and patients will get the care they need," said Assembly Democratic Leader Joseph Roberts, the bill's sponsor. The medical malpractice bill sets up a $90 million fund that would help doctors and hospitals pay insurance premiums for the next three years. It tightens rules on filing lawsuits and gives state regulators the ability to scale back insurance rates that climb too quickly. The proposed measure sets stricter guidelines for filing malpractice lawsuits and gives judges more leeway to control runaway verdicts. The subsidy fund would be paid for by a $50-a-year license fee for doctors, lawyers, chiropractors and dentists and a new tax on employers that would cost $3 for each worker for unemployment insurance.

The legislation has received the endorsement of the Medical Society of New Jersey, which had criticized earlier efforts to address the issue. Last year, society officials argued caps should be placed on the payments juries award to malpractice victims for pain and suffering. The bill contains no limits on the lawsuit awards. Today, the Assembly will also consider another bill that would require doctors and other health-care professionals to report medical eiiOrs involving patients. No such disclosure is now required by the state.

The legislation has become known as the Patient Safety Act. Legislators said actions called for in the bill possibly could have stopped a nurse who claimed to nave killed up to 40 patients in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The Senate has already approved the Patient Safety Act. Each hospital would have to create a review board to look at medical mistakes and come up with solutions to reduce such errors. River Une light-rail operator Joe Perry of Trenton waves to a day of service outside of Bordentown.

The new light-rail line ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTOS northbound light-rail train Sunday on the River Line's first runs between Camden and Trenton. Pedestrian killed on parkway UNION TOWNSHIP A man was killed earlySun-day while attempting to cross the Garden State Parkway on foot, according to a spokesman for the New Jersey Turnpike Authority. The man's identity was not immediately available, but turnpike spokesman Joe Orlando said the accident happened shortly before 2 a.m. "Apparently, the vehicle was disabled on the side of the road, and he attempted to cross the parkway and was struck by two vehicles, according to the preliminary report," Orlando said. Two northbound lanes were temporarily closed while police conducted an investigation.

Officials urge motorists who become disabled to use roadside assistance whenever possible. Drivers with cell phones can do so by pressing 95 while on the turnpike or by hitting GSP on the Garden State Parkway. Meet focuses on community plan CAMDEN -City officials have asked the state Department of Environmental Protection to analyze whether the Waterfront South community is too polluted for residents to stay there. More than 1,000 people are expected to attend a meeting scheduled for today on the issue. While officials await an environmental department decision, nearly $1 million in grants to build and rehabilitate housing in the community have been revoked.

Meanwhile, other Camden neighborhoods have begun to get development money from the state's $175 million takeover plan. Camden's state-appointed chief operating officer under the takeover plan, Melvin "Randy" Primas said he was unlikely to support new housing in the area but would not isolate or forcibly relocate people who already reside there. "I believe it is wrong and disingenuous to populate an area where people can't breathe the air, where folks can't sit out back," Primas told The Philadelphia Inquirer. NJ. seeks shift in water testing NEPTUNE New Jersey will use a new standard this year to measure fecal bacteria in coastal waters, a move that could lead to more swimming bans than last year.

The new standard uses enterococci bacteria instead of fecal coliform to measure the level of fecal pollution. It is required under a mandate set forth by the Environmen-tal Protection Agency under the federal Beaches Environmental Assessment and Coastal Health Act of 2000. Nine states have already adopted the standard, and New Jersey is one of 11 states that are in the process of adopting it. Enterococci are a form of fecal streptococcus bacteria that live in the intestinal tracts of humans and some animals. According to the Environ-mental Protection Agency, the risk of getting gastrointestinal illness can be better predicted by testing for enterococci rather than for fecal coliforms.

From wire reports THISSECT10N Designed and edited by Chris Hermosilla, Jennifer Merkel, Todd Ritter and Brooke Sample. Train enthusiasts, rail supporters excited to be on first cars of new line's tracks. By GEOFF MULV1HILL The Associated Press ABOARD THE RIVER LINE Frank C. Kozempel could not be aboard when the last passenger train chugged along the Cam-den-Amboy line back in June 1963, but he wasn't about to miss when a new rail line opened Sunday, carrying passengers along part of the same route. "I'm delighted to see this finally come to pass," said Kozempel, 74, a Cinnamin-son resident and railroad historian who has served as president of a branch of the National Railroad Historical Society.

Like many of the train buffs almost all of them men, some with groggy children in tow who hopped on the River Line before dawn Sunday to say they were among the first to ride the River Line, Kozempel had a camera dangling around his neck. Unlike most riders, he could recite the history of every rail tower that lay along its route. In the new Camden-to-Trenton light-rail line's past is about a decade's worth of political contention over the $1.1 billion cost and construction delays. Ahead of it are the answers to questions about whether a new commuter rail line slicing through an area that's losing population can find enough riders to justify its cost and help boost the towns along its way. But on Sunday, the River Line's doubters and there are plenty of them stayed home.

The complaints weren't about the existence of the line, for once, but were instead picayune. Laurence Stom, 46, a probation officer who lives in Pine Hill, for example, was disappointed New Jersey Transit officials weren't handing out any sort of souvenirs for the River Line's first paying customers. To commemorate the day, riders simply got train tickets. And not all had them. The tickets work on the honor system, and in the celebratory 'Ed' fans ITU p) ji llfl.

ftr u4 "I'm just riding ft once, just to see how It is." BRANDON HARRIS, Camden Pennsauken station, near where the trains are kept overnight. The passengers it car-. ried didn't have destinations just curiosity about the trains, which they rode up to Trenton and back. Brandon Harris, a 16-year-old Camden resident whose father and two older brothers are bus drivers, said he doesn't tend to go the places the River Line goes and is unlikely to ride it much. "I'm just riding it once, just to see how it is," he said.

For Kozempel, who has been a train buff since he was a seventh-grader in Maple Shade in 1941, watching trains full of Army troops heading to Fort Dix, the inaugural scheduled run of the River Line was especially meaningful. He's been on the last trip for several trains as they shut down over his lifetime. But Sunday's journey was the first time he'd been among the first on a train. viyy "U', I grade crossing along the 34 miles makes for plenty of "choo-choo" helped Stanley become perhaps the first River Line napper. Stanley, a Philadelphia resident who drives school buses for a private school, is a mass-transit rail aficionado.

About twice a month, he said, he trains up to New York City hours from Ottawa the night before and paid $130 for a phone that sat on Ed's desk. Others, such as Lisa and Tim Boomershine, weren't able to get what they wanted. The couple drove 28 hours from Boulder, only to find out that the scoreboard they wanted already had been put aside for "Ed" star Tom Cavanagh. The couple said they liked the light humor of "Ed," but believe its true attraction may have been the fact the main character left New Iff 7 1 1f Passengers on a River Line train that departed from Trenton enjoy the scenery Sunday as they travel to Camden. The line's first train left Camden at 5:45 a.m.

mood of the first trains, no one seemed to care whether passengers paid the $1.10 one-way tickets or not. Warren Stanley, 48, had no complaints. The early hour and the smooth ride on a line with welded rails and none of that familiar "chugga-chugga," although the whistles tooting for each just to ride subways for the day. With the River Line in the mix now, he expects it will be a big part of his transit days. "It's a wonderful ride," he said.

The first train left Camden promptly at 5:45 a.m. Sunday. It already had nearly a earful of passengers who got on at a U.S. for York for a simpler life in Ohio. "Everyone wishes they could do that," Tim Boomershine said.

"Ed" starred Cavanagh as a New York city lawyer named Ed Stevens who returned to his hometown of Stuckeyville, Ohio, after being fired and catching his wife cheating on him. Ed purchased a bowling alley, opened a law practice and Eursued the girl he loved in igh school. The show was canceled in November after four seasons. come from across show memorabilia NBC series filmed in Northvale canceled after four seasons. V( 1 By The Associated Press NORTHVALE From glittery bowling pins to fencing swords to a chicken costume, fans of the canceled NBC television show "Ed" got a chance to take home their very own piece of Stuckeyville.

A converted bowling alley where the comedy was filmed was the site of an auction over the weekend where hundreds of props and set pieces were sold. Companies usually keep those items, said DrewTid-well, a production coordinator for Viacom. But the company decided it would make more sense to auction the items instead of shipping them back to Los Angeles. "To ship all this stuff to Los Angeles or put it in storage costs way too much money," Tidwell said. Maya Saroj drove eight ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO Jacqueline Traub and Noah Lazarus carry two large bowling pins, props their mothers bought Saturday at an auction in Northvale of items from the TV show "Ed.".