Newsday du lieu suivant : New York, New York • 37

1 Pothole, Elver Yiew Gap snarls E. River span By Michael Moss STAFF WRITER For the second time in than a week, a hole opened on an East River bridge yesterday, snarling the evening rush. The culprit is pounding from heavy trucks, including an unknown number loaded beyond legal weight limits, according to city Department of Transportation officials. They said truck traffic on the Manhattan Bridge, where the hole in the upper roadway was discovered about 2 p.m., probably doubled in the past week after the city banned Brooklyn-bound trucks from the Williamsburg Bridge during construction. holes, he added, are going to continue to appear.

Only the wooden plank shielding beneath the roadbed prevented the crumbling concrete from hitting the traffic below. The number of overweight trucks using the bridges is unknown. But in a nine-month period ending last month the DOT handed out 4,706 summonses to truckers for exceeding the citywide limit of 72,780 pounds, according to assistant commissioner John Valles. Additionally, the DOT ticketed 1,036 truckers for violating posted bridge limits, such as the 3-ton limit on the Manhattan Bridge. Reconstruction of the Manhattan Bridge is due to begin this summer.

by-2-foot gap opened up in the Manhattan-bound side of the Williamsburg Bridge. Responding to yesterdays hole, bridge workers discovered several other spots on the upper level of the Manhattan Bridge beginning to crumble. One big steel patch, similar to the one put over yesterdays hole, had come partially loose and started to eat a much larger hole into the roadbed. "The pounding of trucks causes these holes, said Frank N. Gallo, a DOT assistant commissioner.

And the But even as they stood on the Manhattan Bridge yesterday afternoon watching workers slap down a 6-by-10-foot steel patch, the officials said they had little choice but to reopen the Brooklyn-bound lanes to all traffic including trucks last night. Whether we have trucks, tanks or Tonka toys on this bridge, it doesnt matter, said Transportation Commissioner Lucius Riccio. This bridge is in terrible Bhape and has to be rebuilt Trouble has become a regular on the East River crossings. Last Friday, a 2- NawadagrSuaan Mq Dominick Bentivegna, left, Verondo Wilkerson and Carlos Ramos say their boss bombards them with racial slurs. Doormen Cite Race Slurs Leona: Theyll Kill Me By Anthony M.

DeStefano STAFF WRITER Leona Helmsley, a notorious, widely reviled, vastly wealthy New York Jew, may face a great deal of hostility and abuse if sent to federal prison, attorneys for the self-styled hotel queen said in newly filed federal court papers. In an llth-hour effort to keep the 71-year-old Helmsley out of a 4-year prison Btretch for tax evasion and tax fraud, attorney Nathan Dershowitz filed papers with the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in an effort to reduce the sentence to a nonprison alternative. Helmsley. is scheduled to surrender tomorrow.

Her attorneys are scheduled to argue before the federal appeals court today in a final effort to keep her out of prison. Dershowitz, the brother of another Helmsley attorney, Alan Dershowitz, repeated the claim in his latest court papers filed April 3 that if sent to prison, Helmsley will die. An anonymous letter, purportedly sent from the Aryan Brotherhood, said the group was going to issue a cripple contract against Helmsley to assure that she would be mutilated and disfigured in prison, Dershowitz said. Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Hel-lerer, in a letter filed yesterdqy with the appellate court, said Helmsleys appeal was meritless.

Hellerer acknowledged that Helmsley's 83-year -old husband, Harry, was seriously ill. But he was receiving the best medical care that money can buy, he said. Hellerer also said that a lower court judge carefully considered Leona Helms-leyB claims of poor health and concluded that the federal prison system had adequate health care facilities to take care of her problems. dumb nigger, Gino Persi chilli a guinea son of a bitch, and Nolan Padilla a lazy spic." I have absolutely no comment, Nozillo said yesterday. Doorman Dominick Bentivegna said he was threatened with suspension for being in the building lobby while off duty.

The building management later wrote him a letter acknowledging he committed the infraction before it was made a building rule, he said. Its currently under investigation and we are taking this seriously, Human Rights Commission spokesman Lonnie Soury said. If the shift changes or other actions were found to be retaliation for filing a complaint, Nozillo and the condominium board of directors could be liable for monetary damages, he said. According to the complaint, Nozillo, a former doorman at the building, began his campaign of harassment against black and Hispanic workers after he became superintendent in September, 1988. When white workers complained about the treatment of their colleagues, they too were harassed, they said.

The building, on the south side of 72nd Street between Park and Madison Avenues, became a condominium about five years ago. Five-room units cost about $500,000 in the late 1980s, which is the most recent Bales data. Residents include lawyer Ivan Fisher and Prince Egon Von Furstenburg. The former U.S. ambassador to Austria, Henry Grunwald, owns an apartment, but rents it out.

By William Murphy STAFF WRITER The doormen and other workers at a ritzy East Side condominium charge they have been the targets of constant racial slurs for more than three years from a bullying building superintendent. Six of the seven workers a porter, a handyman and five doormen at 50 E. 72nd St filed a complaint with the citys Human Rights Commission last month. Shortly afterward, superintendent Gerald Nozillo changed their work shifts and hnrnmted them with threats of suspension, according to the workers. The harassment included, but was not limited to: making derogatory racial and ethnic slurs, issuing written warnings to nonwhites for not clocking out, interrupting personal telephone conversations with racial slurs and requesting that they go to school to learn to speak English, the complaint said.

The workers said they also named the condominium board and two of its officers, James Dauria and Robert Taub, as defendants, because they were told of Nozil-los actions and did nothing about it. An attorney for the condominium board, Harold Weiner, denied there had been any discrimination and quid that Nozillo was just trying to get the employees to work harder. Hes an equal-opportunity rough guy. He just wants the job done, Weiner said. The workers charge Nozillo called Liaquat Mohammad a dot head, doorman Verondo Wilkerson a NfcW YOHK NfcWSUAY, TUESDAY, APRIL 14, 1932 r.t-e kf yf.