November 17, 1995

On a recent morning, G. Michael Brown, the top executive in the Mashantucket Pequot Indians' gambling empire, barked orders to an ever-changing audience of lawyers, accountants, architects and lobbyists as he juggled a series of projects that would make rival developers' eyes bulge. Rising outside his office at the Foxwoods Resort Casino in eastern Connecticut was a 17-story, 1,229-room hotel, supposed to be the largest in New England under a single roof. Next door, work on the nation's first smoke-free gaming rooms was on schedule for a New Year's Eve opening.

The management turmoil at Time Warner Inc. continued yesterday, as Michael Fuchs, the longtime head of the company's Home Box Office cable network who only recently added the Warner Music Group to his portfolio, was forced out of the company in a shake-up that gives broad new powers to the top executives at the Warner Brothers film division. Mr. Fuchs was forced to resign by Time Warner's chairman, Gerald Levin, who in the last year has accepted the resignations of a number of executives who were highly regarded in the entertainment business but who ran afoul of Mr. Levin.

MANAGED CARE PROGRAMS ARE FAULTED Posing as Medicaid patients, state health investigators called 18 large managed care programs and asked to see doctors for such basic but essential services as prenatal care, immunizations of babies and annual checkups. At 13 of the 18, the investigators had so much trouble just getting an initial appointment that the state cited them for deficiencies. [Page A1.]

A judge set bail at $350,000 yesterday for a Hoboken man charged with carjacking 11 taxi cabs in Jersey City, Hoboken, Union City and Harrison since Oct. 23. According to Ed DeFazio, First Assistant Prosecutor for Hudson County, Victor DeGross, 35, is accused of robbing drivers and forcing them from their vehicles but did not harm them. He is not a suspect in the taxi driver slayings in Newark, the Prosecutor said.

Hoping to reduce violence in New York City's schools, the City Council unanimously approved a law making it illegal for students to carry box cutters and banning their sale to anyone under 18. The razors have become a favorite student weapon because they are cheap and easy to obtain and hide. School officials seized 2,247 box cutters last year. Article, page B9.