June 25, 1992

AT the home of Gary and Kari Johnson, eight endangered Indian elephants play along a hillside, basking in the Southern California sun and scratching their rough hides against granite boulders. Meanwhile, just south of Boston, Himalayan snow leopards snooze in Albert H. Porges's backyard. And in Baltimore, Miki Sparzak's white Rothschild's myna bird -- one of about 500 left in the world -- raises its crown, cocks its black beak straight up and crows softly. From Australian parakeets to Indian pythons, endangered species are being kept and bred in backyards and basements across the United States. About 850 people have registered to keep endangered animals under the Fish and Wildlife Service's Captive-Bred Wildlife Registration program.

NEW YORK CITY PROPOSED ALL-CIVILIAN REVIEW BOARD Mayor Dinkins will propose the establishment of an all-civilian review board to investigate charges of police brutality, officials in the Dinkins administration said. The Mayor's plan is a setback to Police Commissioner Brown, who has long opposed such a board. A1. Civilian Complaint Review Board has difficult task. B4. CHECKING FOR AIRPLANE ICE A USAir official defended the method of checking for ice on an airliner's wing by looking through the cockpit windows. That was the method reportedly used before a USAir jet crashed on takeoff from La Guardia Airport on a snowy March night, killing 27. B3. GOTTI BEGINS LIFE SENTENCE As John Gotti began a life sentence in what the authorities call the nation's harshest Federal prison, in Marion, Ill., the F.B.I. said a special squad was closing in on illicit wealth he secreted in the last six years. B3. COMFORTING THOSE WHO PROVIDE COMFORT Help in dealing with death has long been available for family members and friends, but it is only recently that the needs of nurses, social workers and others who care for the dying on a daily basis have been recognized. Across the New York region increasing numbers of professionals are forming bereavement groups. B3. REGION INSURANCE FOR POOR CHILDREN After a slow start, largely because few people knew about it, a New York state program that provides health insurance for the children of the working poor now covers 27,000 children. The new program, Child Health Plus, is quickly outgrowing its $20 million budget. B5. A REVIVAL OF 'THE AMITYVILLE HORROR' In a revival of the case that inspired the haunted-house tale "Amityville Horror," the man convicted of killing his parents and four brothers and sisters 18 years ago has returned to court on Long Island, claiming that his original lawyer had movie contracts, rather than defense strategy, on his mind. B6. PUTNAM MAN LINKED TO NAZI WAR CRIMES The Department of Justice is seeking to revoke the citizenship of a 73-year-old man from Putnam County, N.Y., who it said has admitted to taking part in the massacre of 50 Jews at a concentration camp while he was a sergeant in a Nazi extermination unit in World War II. B7. FORMER JERSEY CITY MAYOR SENTENCED Gerald McCann, the ousted Mayor of Jersey City, was sentenced to 33 months in prison for defrauding a Florida savings and loan association of $240,000, but he was allowed to remain free until Sept. 30 so he can attend his sister's wedding. Mr. McCann was also ordered to pay $170,000 in restitution to the Resolution Trust Corporation, the Federal agency that took over the assets of the savings association after it failed. B7. Bleak predictions about impact of New Jersey budget. B7. Railroad riders spared the chaos that an Amtrak strike would have caused. A18. Lower Manhattan Journal B3

The Federal Government's trade agency ruled today that Detroit's auto makers had not suffered significant harm from imported Japanese mini-vans, a verdict that prevents the Commerce Department from proceeding with plans to impose tariffs on the imports. The decision by the independent agency, the International Trade Commission, to reject a highly political case is a landmark in American trade policy. It reflects the presence of a new majority, more skeptical of industry claims, on the little-known body, which has the power to block American industries from receiving Commerce Department protection from imports. A Former Member's Analysis Three new commissioners -- two Republicans and a Democrat -- have joined the six-member body in recent months, and the two Republicans appear to be taking a much narrower interpretation of the nation's trade law than their predecessors. Their terms will last as long as nine years.

I.M.F. Is Planning $1 Billion Loan for Russia To speed aid to Russia, the International Monetary Fund is planning to lend Moscow $1 billion to help pay for crucial imports in a simplified agreement that the agency hopes to complete in the next few weeks. Page A10. De Klerk Move Is Rejected South Africa's President said he would accept a foreign inquiry into township violence, but the African National Congress rejected the offer and called for a boycott against the nation's athletes. Page A12. Redistricting Plan Advances The Justice Department gave almost total approval to the redistricting plan for the New York State Legislature, requiring only one modification for the Assembly plan. Page B1. Howe Banned From Baseball The Yankee pitcher, who had previously been suspended six times, was permanently barred by Commissioner Fay Vincent following a guilty plea in a cocaine case. Page B13. AIDS Curriculum in New York After weeks of bitter fighting, the New York City Board of Education agreed on an AIDS curriculum for elementary schools. Page B1. 'Crazy Eddie' Is Arrested Crazy Eddie's founder, Eddie Antar, was arrested in Israel on securities-fraud charges two years after the demise of his store chain. Page D1.

Reaffirming its precedents that bar state-sponsored prayer in the public schools, the Supreme Court ruled today that a clergyman's invocation and benediction at a Providence, R.I., junior high school graduation transgressed the constitutional boundary between church and state. The 5-to-4 ruling was a decisive, if narrow, rebuff to the Bush Administration, which had seized on the case as an occasion to urge the Court to abandon its longstanding approach to deciding when an official practice amounts to an "establishment" of religion, prohibited by the First Amendment. The Administration had urged the Court to adopt a standard permitting a much greater role for religion in public life.