Cross-endorsements completed for Supreme Court seats

Two Suffolk Republican candidates for state Supreme Court -- incumbent Emily Pines and County Court Judge Jack Toomey -- have gotten the ballot line of the Independence Party for the November election.

But it may be small consolation for those candidates. The minor party also backed the three Suffolk contenders in a Democratic-Conservative cross-endorsement deal -- Democrats Robert Quinlan and District Court Judge William Ford, and Conservative Howard Heckman.

In addition, the Independence Party also nominated two of its own party members David Morris and Kathy Bergmann, who will also have the Conservative ballot line in November.

GOP officials also say that Patricia Filiberto, 68, an Islip district court judge who did not get renominated in May, will be named as a state Supreme Court nominee to replace Howard Long Jr. of Dix Hills, who declined the nomination.

Long was named at the last minute at the GOP judicial convention last month when Islip GOP chairman Frank Tantone declined to accept the nomination once the Conservative-Democratic cross endorsement deal was announced.