September 21, 1995

It was a tense morning yesterday at Terminal C at Newark International Airport. First a man from Hawaii tried to kill himself by jumping off a roadway, the authorities said. Later the bomb squad was called in to inspect unattended bags spotted in the terminal; they turned out to belong to the man who jumped, critically injuring himself.

FOR years, American parents have been encouraged to help their children join the ranks of computer-literate, Internet cruisers. Coax them into the high-tech future, goes the theory, or they will join the benighted have-nots of the information age. Yet, suddenly it seems that cyberspace is a dangerous place for children. Last week, in a major raid, Federal agents arrested more than a dozen people who were charged with using America Online, the nation's largest computer network, to distribute child pornography and lure minors into sex.

Seagate Technology Inc. said today that it had reached an agreement to acquire Conner Peripherals Inc. in a stock swap valued at $1.1 billion. With 1994 sales of $4.5 billion, Seagate is already the largest maker of disk drives in terms of revenue; a deal would move the company past the Quantum Corporation as the largest in terms of units as well.

The disappointment was audible. "I don't understand it!"

Saying box cutters have become "the weapon of choice for many gangs and violence-prone youths," Assemblyman LeRoy J. Jones Jr., a Democrat of East Orange, introduced legislation to make it a crime to sell box cutters to anyone under 18. The crime would carry a maximum penalty of 18 months in prison and a $7,000 fine.