Daily News from New York, New York • 5

f3M ylAt3 DAILY HI Thursday, DD(oI(o)M Hookers offered freebies By JOANNE WASSERMAN and DON SINGLETON Dady News Staff Writers Suspected hookers who walked into Manhattan Criminal Court on prostitution charges last night will walk out this morning with complimentary boxes of designer condoms. The prophylactics some mint-flavored will be distributed along with safe-sex information as part of a program inaugurated by Judge Gustin Reichbach, who said he wants to protect the women and their sex partners from AIDS and help them break from the cycle of revolving-door justice. "More conservative judges tend to fine prostitutes, with a jail alternative, but to me, fining them and sending them back out on the street Joyce Wallace, president of the Foundation for Research on Sexually Transmitted Diseases, St. Vincent's Hospital and the Fortune Society, which helps ex-convicts. Allen James, deputy director of the Fortune Society, said some of the condoms are mint-flavored "because the organizations that distribute them try to make safe-sex practices more attractive." Reichbach said he believes the distribution of the condoms is appropriate "since oral sex seems to be the main mechanism of commerce." Wallace, who has done extensive AIDS testing and counseling of the city's street hookers, agreed that there is a need "to educate prostitutes as to safe-sex practices so they don't become infected and infect others." puts the city in the position of being a pimp," said Reich-bach, a Brooklyn Civil Court judge serving temporarily on night court.

Radical past "The more liberal judges sentence them to time served, up to 20 or 30 hours," said Reichbach, who was a student radical at Columbia University in the 1960s. "But I'm not satisfied with that, because there's no attempt to reach out to provide some service to these women everybody accepts it as a problem you can't do anything about." Reichbach's plan comes a month after the Board of Education, in one of its most controversial decisions, approved making condoms available to the city's high school students. The judge said that during his four nights on the night court bench, he will have a table in the courtroom or nearby hallway, where a team of experts will provide the women with information and referrals for free AIDS testing and counseling. Ordered to 'contemplate "The conditions for their release will be that there is no rearrest for 36 hours, and that they use the time to review and contemplate the information that's being pro (gDUDP vided," Reichbach said. "In the event that any of them are interested in getting out of the life, a van will be available to take them to a safe house, where they can get shelter and referrals for all sorts of help," he said.

"I don't have any illusions about changing that world, but if even one person a night takes any action goes for a test, or signs up for counseling I will consider that a success. We have to convince these women to use condoms, not just with the customers, but with their boyfriends, many of whom are IV drug users." In setting up the program, Reichbach was aided by Dr. New Lots Ave. housing project SfWpH wt T'T Cry alerts a porter inBldyn By SHARON BROUSSARD Daily News Staff Writer A newborn boy was saved from being crushed to death in a trash compactor yesterday when a building porter at a Brooklyn housing project heard the infant's cries minutes before pushing the compactor button. Police seeking the baby's mother questioned a 12-year-old girl who lived in the building and had looked pregnant in recent months, relatives and the building manager said.

Police declined comment The baby was in stable condition and under intensive care at Brookdale Hospital, where nurses named him Trevor. It was uncertain who would get custody of the boy. Startled by noise McArthur Williams, 46, a porter at the Noble Drew Ali Plaza housing project on New Lots Ave. in Brownsville, said he was about to press the compactor button at 9:45 a.m. when a noise startled him.

"The trash compactor was running and when I heard the baby crying, I turned it off. If it hadn't have cried, the baby would have been gone for sure." The startled Williams called two other porters to help. One summoned police. The other, Earnest Ad- See EASY Page 30 POLICE OFFICER holds bag in which baby boy was found yesterday at WILLIE ANDERSON DAILY NEWS.