The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 1

COLOR Kill HA "t'-trt a oSi' mmm com tr fi I N. Y. housewife abandoned newborn in lavatory Mm got tmktf Prime rate up to 9.5 Wall Street takes the news quietly linn i ii linn m'mw'inmiim -V 5 vjr Li''- i- iy i -ffi, r. Infant thrives on doting care at Mills Hospital By Stanton Samuelson and Craig Marine OF THE EXAMINER STAFF REDWOOD CITY A Staten Is-land housewife was charged with felony child endangerment Thursday in the case of the "miracle baby" who was abandoned for six hours in a sealed lavatory on a cross-country DC-10 flight. Authorities earlier had booked Christina Locasto, 24, on attempted murder charges but sought the child abuse charge Thursday afternoon during an arraignment hearing.

Authorities backed away from the initial charges when they determined there was not sufficient evidence to prove that she intended to kill her baby hen she allegedly stuffed it under the restroom sink and abandoned it, said Assistant District Attorney Stephen Wags-taff. Wagstaff said Locasto could face up to six years in prison on the child abuse charge. The newborn girl, suffering from hypothermia and cuts on her back, was reported in good condition at Mills Memorial Hospital, where nurses said she was bathed in love. San Mateo County sheriff's investigators said Locasto turned herself in at 4:15 a.m., appearing "exhausted and somewhat upset." In worse shape was her 28-year-old husband, Louis, who operates a limousine service in New York. He was described by Lt.

Michael Dir-ickson as "shocked, upset and very emotional." He doesn't face criminal charges See INFANT, back page By Rick Gladstone ASSOCIATED PRESS NEW YORK Big banks Thursday raised their prime lending rate a half-percentage point to 9.5 percent the highest level in more than two years signaling more expensive loans for consumers and businesses. It was the second boost in the key lending rate this year and reflected the banks' own costs of borrowing money, which has been rising steadily over the past few months. The prime is watched closely because bankers use it as a basis for calculating loans to businesses and for determining many types of fixed and adjustable-rate consumer loans, including popular home-equity loans. Chase Manhattan Bank in New York was the first to announce the rate increase. It was quickly followed by other big banks, including Citibank, First National Bank of Chicago and Manufacturers Hanover.

They were later joined by California's Bank of America, Security Pacific National Bank, First Interstate, Wells Fargo, Bank of California and California First Bank. Chase said its rate change, which would go into effect immediately, was aimed at keeping pace with other interest rates and was not based on future worries. The last increase in the prime was on May 11, from 8.5 percent to 9 percent. Thursday's increase put the prime at the highest point since March 1986. Wall Street shrugged off the increase, partly because it had been widely expected.

On Wall Street, See PRIME, A-14 Mission Bay gets for controversial By Gerald D. Adams EXAMINER URBAN PLANNING WRITER The Port Commission has approved a controversial land swap that would give the Mission Bay development 24 acres of city-owned waterfront in exchange for 50 acres of less valuable turf. The exchange, unanimously approved in a secret session Wednesday, would allow Santa Fe Pacific Realty to add an 18-acre waterfront park to Mission Bay. The swap still requires formal sanction by the state Lands Commission and final approval of financial terms by the Port Commission. The deal would provide Santa Fe Pacific with land to expand its proposed $2 billion Mission Bay community land that is earmarked in eity and port master plans for a future container cargo terminal at Piers 48-50.

Jim Augustino, project director for Santa Fe Pacific, called the Port Commission's action "a positive ExaminerCraig Lee the jetliner 'miracle baby' nestles in arms of nurse Lori Parks at Mills Memorial Hospital, San Mateo Cuban denies U.S. assertion of accord on Angola, Namibia Carlos Sslinas do Oortari He won 50.3 of the vote in Mexico's disputed election It's official: Salinas wins Mexico race SIDE Bay Serious Roger Craig's Giants are hot; the A's are in first. Is a Bay Series far PageB-1 Jail manual The state yanks support from jail employee training programs that use a manual describing guards as lion tamers and prisoners as dangerous beasts. Page A-17 Trade bill The House approves and sends to the Senate a 1,000 page trade bill. Page A-24 Montana on the run 49er quarterback Joe Montana, weighing in at 198 pounds, says he's in top shape and ready to report to Rocklin on Sunday.

His off-season shape-up program included daily running, weight lifting and shadow boxing. Page B-1 H-P denial Hewlett-Packard Co. fires a sharp denial to Apple Computer Inc's copyright infringement lawsuit and names Apple in an anti-trust coun-tersuit. PageC-1 Summary of the newsBack page Autos C-17 Bridge D-12 Business C-1 Comics D-11 Classified B-9 Editorials A-22 Horoscope 0-3 Arm Landers D-12 Rob Morse A-3 Metro A-17 Obituaries A-21 Spectra C-9 Sports B-1 Style D-1 Television D-4 Weather D-10 124th Year, No. 28 0 preliminary OK land-swap deal step" to hasten planning of the residential-commercial complex.

But Jack Morrison, a director of San Francisco Tomorrow, took a swipe at commissioners for acting on the matter in executive session. "It's very ill-advised to lock out the public from such a discussion," Morrison said. "There was no necessity for it. It's a policy matter. The public ought to be informed and have an opportunity to state a posi-' tion.

"If San Francisco Tomorrow had known about this, we would have (testified) on this issue." San Francisco Tomorrow is a citizens' conservation group. The item was advertised in the commission's agenda only as "an executive session to discuss specified real estate negotiations (as) authorized under California government code." Commissioners were advised to hold the discussion in private by Deputy City Attorney Lisa Clay. Clay later said, "These are sensi- See PORT, A-14 dropping plans to move up a scheduled 1990 Southern California oil lease sale by a year to raise $110 million lost by a delay of another lease sale in Northern California. But in exchange, Johnston won approval of a $75 million lease sale in Bristol Bay, Alaska. The region is home to many endangered species as well as a $l-bil-lion-a-year fishing industry.

For years, fishermen and environmentalists have fought to prevent drilling there. "You don't sacrifice one member of the family to protect another member of the family," Robert Hat-toy, director of the Southern California Sierra Club, told the Los Angeles Times after the Senate ap- See INTERIOR back page tions that began Monday, an agreement had not been reached. "I would say it is not precise to say that an agreement has been reached on the withdrawal of Cuban troops," he said. "This issue is part of all the discussions, is part of a process that is continuing. I would qualify it as inexact to say that an agreement has been reached on the withdrawal of all Cuban troops.

"It is our opinion that we made substantial progress," he said, speaking in Spanish through an interpreter. Private meetings among the negotiators began Monday at the U.S. Coast Guard station on Governors Island in New York Harbor and concluded Wednesday at their hotel. In discussing the talks Wednesday, Crocker said, "From our point of view, we have a structure in place. I am not predicting that it is going to work, but another impor- See ANGOLA, A-14 OFFICER LESTER GARNIER 'He was a super person dog king." Sunday night, as Gamier sat in his car in a Walnut Creek shopping center, two bullets were fired, execution-style, into See COP, A-14 EXAMINER NEWS SERVICES UNITED NATIONS A Cuban official contradicted Thursday a U.S.

announcement that negotiators for Angola, Cuba and South Africa have agreed on a set of principles laying the groundwork for Pretoria to end its 73-year rule in Namibia and for Cuban troops to leave Angola. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Chester Crocker, who mediated the fourth round of Angolan peace talks, said Wednesday, "We have reached a set of principles that is the core of the settlement and the guidepost for negotiators." He said that as part of the agreement, 50,000 Cuban troops would be withdrawn from Angola, but that no timetable had been established for the pullout. But on Thursday, Alcibiades Hidalgo, a member of the policy-making central committee of Cuba's Communist Party, said that while progress had been made in negotia Slain cop dreamt of a better life By Elizabeth Fernandez OF THE EXAMINER STAFF The day after he was slain, San Francisco policeman Lester Gamier got his hot dog permit. For months, the ambitious young man had been planning his first stake at building an empire.

He'd bought a pushcart, scouted out the perfect corner in the Financial District, tabulated the bulk price of relish. If his first hot dog stand were successful, he told his sister, he'd open another, then another. Someday, "he would be the hot Wilson and McCarthy tricked in north coast drilling trade-off By John Ross EXAMINER CORRESPONDENT MEXICO CITY After a week of delays, accusations of fraud and mounting tension, Mexico's Federal Election Commission declared Carlos Salinas de Gortari has been elected president by the slimmest margin in the history of Mexico's ruling party. The final count gave Salinas, candidate of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, 9.64 million votes, or just 50.36 percent of the total, and center-left candidate Cuauhtemoc Cardenas 5.96 million, or 31.12 percent The conservative National Action Party candidate Manuel' Clouthier was third with 3.27 million votes, or 17 percent. Two minor party candidates, from the center-right and the extreme left, received close to one percent each.

PRI's official majority, the smallest since the party began ruling Mexico in 1929, was greeted with renewed charges of fraud from opposition candidates. "In many garbage dumps and on isolated roads, in some rivers of the republic are flowing electoral material marked in favor of parties of the opposition," Jorge Amador, a National Democratic Front supporter on the commission said early Thursday. Responding to the official vote totals Wednesday night, opposition party members of the electoral commission rolled into the commis- -See MEXICO, A-14 By Mike Connolly EXAMINER WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON The Senate has approved a one-year moratorium on oil drilling off Northern California and dropped a bid to speed up oil and gas exploration off Southern California but at the expense of an environmentally delicate Alaskan waterway. The tradeoff took both of California's VS. Senate candidates, Democratic Lt.

Gov. Leo McCarthy and Republican incumbent Sen. Pete Wilson, by surprise. Both announced their support for the coastal drilling halts without realizing the move could open the way for drilling in Alaska. The measure, drafted by Sen.

J. Bennett Johnston, calls for.