Spin cycle: Steve Israel's Disney windfall

Rep. Steve Israel (D-Dix Hills) got $2,804.18 from the state for 60 shares of the Walt Disney Co. he thought he'd lost to Neverland. Israel bought the stock through a brokerage firm when his daughter was born in 1987, an aide said. He held on to it and declared it worth between $1 and $1,000 on his 2001 and 2002 financial disclosure reports. When he tried to retrieve the stock in 2002, he found the firm had closed and stopped reporting it. But in his 2011 disclosure last week, Israel said he learned the stock was turned over to the state in 1999. The comptroller sold it last year, and sent Israel the check.

-- Tom Brune