Newsday (Suffolk Edition) from Melville, New York • 55

RENO AT LARGE A55 Morgan's Change at Top Contains No Surprises By Susan Harrigan up, going to school at night. For a time, he was a STAFF WRITER foreign exchange trader. Dennis Weatherstone, chairman of J.P. Morgan The soft-spoken Weatherstone is considered more the nation's fifth-largest banking company, yes- spontaneous than Warner, who fits the mold of a clasterday became the second major Wall Street figure to sic J.P. Morgan banker.

An Ohioan and a graduate of retire this week. Yale University, Warner has risen steadily through Weatherstone's announcement that he will step the ranks in the area of corporate finance. down on Jan. 1 was expected, in contrast with the Under Weatherstone, J.P. Morgan has grown from surprise retirement Tuesday of Stephen Friedman, a traditional commercial bank into a global investthe head of Goldman, Sachs Co.

ment banking concern that not only lends to companWeatherstone, 63, will be succeeded as chairman by ies, but underwrites their securities and trades widely Douglas A. (Sandy) Warner III, 48, who has been in instruments such as derivatives, financial conpresident of J.P. Morgan since 1990. tracts that are linked to other financial instruments. "He had made no secret of his in- Its earnings are expected to be lower this year than tention to retire in the relatively near future, and last, but the drop is due to difficult market conditions there's certainly no surprise about Sandy Warner suc- compared with a "blow-out strong year" in 1993, acceeding," said Raphael Soifer, a banking analyst at cording to David S.

Berry, a banking analyst at Keefe, Brown Brothers Harriman Co. Bruyette Woods. Warner has spent his entire career at the company, An embarrassing blemish on the bank's record durand isn't considered likely to make major changes in ing Weatherstone's tenure was its multimillion-dollar its direction. investment in Banco Espanol de Credito, Spain's Nevertheless, there are differences between the two fourth-largest bank, through Corsair, a partnership executives. named after the yacht of founder J.P.

Morgan. The Weatherstone, a British-born Horatio Alger-type Spanish government later took over the troubled who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1990, bank to prevent a run, and Morgan could lose part of joined the bank when he was 16 and worked his way its investment. It's War in Game In Industry KOMBAT from A53 that Mortal Kombat is made for systems manufacPage tured by Sega of America and Nintendo of America. Doom II will be for IBM-compatible personal is hoping to keep the lead with Mortal Kombat II. Dan Harnett said 2.5 million copies of the computers.

Spokesman Ron Chaimowitz, GT's executive vice released on "Mortal as Acclaim president, game said IBM, Microsoft and Apple Computer have were exdubbed Sept. 9. The release was accompanied by a million television and pressed interest in expanding their operating systems on to accommodate Doom II. A cartridge version of $10 advertising campaign radio, and in newspapers and movie theaters. The Doom advanced is planned for using game systems campaign appeared more befitting the release of a next year.

movie than a video game. The game itself was created by ID Software Inc. of But as a result, the company has received orders for Mesquite, Texas. "You wreak massive destruction," 250,000 games. Acclaim hopes Mortal Kombat II will ID's business manager, Jay Wilbur, said in explaining do even better than Mortal Kombat which sold a the game.

"If it moves, you shoot it." The fictional staggering 6 million cartridges at an average price of player in Doom II is a tough Marine in the future on $50, grossing $300 million at retail. the planet Mars when, suddenly, "an experiment goes Early indications are that Mortal Kombat II is sell- awry and a rift opens up between our plane of exising at a faster pace than its predecessor, said Lee tence and hell. The demons are coming, and you've Isgur, a video games analyst for Jeffries Co. in San got to go get Francisco. "But it's still early.

If you look at a movie, Chaimowitz said GT expects an initial shipment of it takes a few weeks before you know" how successful 300,000 copies of Doom II, and that more than 1 milit might be, Isgur said. lion will be shipped during a 12-month period. The Mortal Kombat II might face some stiff competition original Doom, which came out last December, was this fall and winter. Doom II, to be published by GT sold through the "shareware" method of marketing. Interactive Software of New York City, is said to be Computer users sample an abbreviated version at a every bit as engaging.

Mortal Kombat II retails for cost of $3.99 to $5.99, and then, if they are interested, $65 to $75, depending on the type of video system it is buy the rest of the game. purchased for. Doom II will go on sale for $45 to $55 Although Mortal Kombat II and Doom II make on Oct. 10, "Doom's Day," as GT Interactive calls it. use of different systems, they are nonetheless comAdvertising for Doom II is expected to cost between petitive.

$3 million and $5 million. "If a kid has $40 to spend and he has to make a One of the key differences between the games is decision, it's competition," Wilbur said. Suits on Ford Bronco II Settled THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Washington Free inspections and advice on vehicle handling are part of a proposed settlement announced yesterday involving about 700,000 Ford Bronco II models, the subject of lawsuits contending they are prone to rollovers. The class-action settlement agreed to by Ford Motor Co. and attorneys representing owners must be approved by a federal court in Louisiana and a state court in Alabama.

The case involves the 1983-90 Bronco II, a sportutility vehicle that Ford no longer manufactures. It is smaller and designed differently than the Ford Bronco, which isn't part of the litigation. Ford began notifying Bronco II owners of the proposed settlement yesterday. Owners who agree to the settlement would receive a sticker cautioning drivers to avoid unnecessary sharp turns or other abrupt maneuvers; a videotape detailing how the Bronco II's Well, We've Solved The Potty Problem But Little Else Sweet progress has indeed made us a more comfortable nation. Building and health codes, minimum wages, fairer distribution of incomes, federal housing subsidies, tax breaks for mortgage payers, can make a difference.

You might even imagine we are a nation Robert capable of creating an affordable universal Reno health care system, per- The Census Bureau has just reported that better than 99 percent of American households have indoor potties. This may not seem so remarkable, but did you know that in 1940, a time when a lot of us were alive, 35 percent of Americans were freezing their fannies off every winter sitting in outhouses? Another good thing that has happened is that the incidence of black widow spider bites has declined rapidly in the same period, particularly in the southeastern United States, where one of their favorite habitats was the underside of privy seats. haps even mastering the crime problem. In 1940, when crime rates were lower and the state of the nation's plumbing was deplorable, who would have guessed that these conditions would have reversed themselves by the end of the century? And if you asked the average American what has caused crime to rise, you'd get a laundry list that would include lenient judges, police departments hog-tied by Warren Court decisions, a general breakdown in the system all things to do with the perception that the nation has become softer on crime in lockstep with the rise in the incidence of crime. Putting more people in jail is viewed as the most effective remedy, while failure to do SO is popularly supposed to be the most identifiable cause of the problem.

But a comparative study of world prison populations just reported by the Sentencing Project, a group that promotes alternative sentencing, shows that the United States has achieved prodigies of incarceration in the last 50 years and is putting prisoners away at a faster rate than any nation on Earth, save Russia. America now has 519 prisoners for every 100,000 Americans. Russia has 558. South Africa has an incarceration rate of 368 per 100,000. Even Singapore's rate is only 229.

Canada's is 116. Mexico's is 97, England's is 93 and Australia's, 91. Even more impressive if these sort of figures impress you are the massive leaps the United States had made in the last 10 years. In 1940, the U.S. incarceration rate counting inmates of all prisons and jails was 206 per 100,000 people.

Between then and 1980, the rate hovered in a range between 160 and 200. Then it took off, reaching 319 by 1985, 473 by 1990 and 519 last year. These are levels normally associated with police states. And when the boom in prison construction envisioned in the federal crime bill just signed reaches its peak, it is possible to imagine an incarcerated population that proportionately exceeds records set by the Soviet Union under Stalin. Two conclusions can safely be drawn: The American criminal justice system, as a mechanism for churning out punishment, has not broken down, indeed is operating at unprecedented rates.

And sharply higher rates of punishment by incarceration either as an example to others or a means of removing criminally inclined people from society have not coincided with sharp declines in crime rates, nor made this a nation Robert Reno handling characteristics are different from ordinary cars, and a supplement to the owner's guide. They also would be entitled to a free dealership inspection to make sure that no changes were made since the purchase that would compromise the vehicle's stability, such as different tire size. "By definition, sport-utility vehicles have some different handling characteristics," said Ford counsel John Beisner. "They are designed differently so they may be driven particularly in off-road situations. That doesn't mean they're defective in any way." He said that a jury has never found the vehicle to be defective.

Several cases have been settled out of court. Owners have until Oct. 17 to opt out of the settlement. They wouldn't get the kit or free inspection, but they would retain their right to sue Ford for economic damages based solely on their ownership of the vehicle. However, even owners who agree to the settlement can sue if they are involved in an accident in a Bronco II..