New York Briefs

Mob defendant says

lunch is an injustice

Vincent "Vinny Gorgeous" Basciano is still facing the death penalty, but he's out from under the lunch penalty.

The former Bonnano family acting boss, on trial in Brooklyn federal court for murder, complained through his lawyer Wednesday that he wasn't getting adequate "sustenance" in the meals provided at lunch time by the U.S. Marshals.

"You mean he wants a sandwich from the Carnegie deli?" cracked U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis.

Basciano lawyer George Goltzer said the government-approved sandwiches had a single slice of baloney, and his client wanted his legal team to bring him something a little more filling from the third-floor cafeteria.

The judge said he was willing to take the matter of a "more fulsome lunch" up with Basciano's guard detail "so he can have more energy in the afternoon." But prosecutors objected, asking whether taxpayer funds -- which are paying for Basciano's legal defense -- would finance his special fare.

"That's offensive," responded Goltzer, who then offered to pay for the sandwich himself.

By the end of the day, the marshals had approved. Beginning Thursday, Basciano will get his pick of cold cuts -- or even tuna salad -- while he watches a parade of government informants try to bury him. Goltzer said he hasn't placed his first order yet.

New chancellor visits

school that's closing

On his first school day as head of New York City's public school system, Chancellor Dennis Walcott visited a school that is slated to be closed and promised students he would not forget about them.

"Just because a school is going through a transition doesn't mean that we're going to forget about our students at all," Walcott said at Paul Robeson High School in Brooklyn, to be phased out starting in September.

He said he would create a network to support schools while they are being closed.

Walcott, a onetime kindergarten teacher and former head of the Urban League who spent the last eight years as a deputy mayor under Mayor Michael Bloomberg, has said he hopes to calm the rhetoric on contentious issues like closing schools and forcing traditional public schools to share space with charter schools.

"We have to focus the debate on what is in the best interests of our children," he said on yesterday's radio show.

Obama attends

fundraisers in cityPresident Barack Obama plunged into donor-rich New York yesterday, his first fundraising sweep of the city since announcing his re-election bid this month, with a lament that he has not seen his wish for less-polarizing politics realized.

"The hope that I had that we'd start coming together in a serious way . . . has been resisted," Obama told contributors gathered at the home of financier and former New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine.

His intention, Obama said, is to make the 2012 campaign an "election in which we're not just talking slogans . . . but we are looking soberly at the choices we face."

Three Democratic Party in New York fundraisers were scheduled across midtown Manhattan, including a dinner at The Waldorf-Astoria hotel. He was expected to raise between $2 million and $3 million.

'Knockoff' buyers face fine under bill

Bargain-hunting shoppers looking for cheap knockoffs on pricey designer bags are the target of a bill proposed by Manhattan City Councilwoman Margaret Chin that she plans to introduce at Thursday's council meeting.

If passed, Chin said, the bill would fine anyone buying a counterfeit designer bag in the five boroughs $1,000 on a misdemeanor charge.

She said the bill would help to increase sales taxes lost to street sales by encouraging tourists and shoppers to buy handbags in one of many city boutique stores. "We have many local designers in lower Manhattan who offer unique bags at affordable prices that pay sales taxes," she said.

Compiled with wire reports