April 26, 1996

One victim of a Clifton developer's real estate scam, prosecutors say, was a bus boy whose wife left him after he lost his down payment. Another victim stopped buying her children toys and other frills to save for her down payment. The developer, Michael Pazden, was convicted by a Passaic County jury yesterday of bilking at least 40 investors out of $968,000 from 1989 to 1991 by promising them condominiums at a phony project, supposedly located at a former industrial site off Route 3, said John Snowdon, an assistant prosecutor for Passaic County. "The judge will no doubt order restitution, but I don't think anybody expects to see anything," Mr. Snowdon said.

Anti-abortion activists should be allowed to stand on the sidewalk in front of abortion clinics to counsel women who are going inside, a state appeals court ruled yesterday. Keith Paterson, an attorney representing anti-abortion activists who appeared outside the Women's Choice of Bergen County clinic in Hackensack, said the ruling made an important distinction between counseling women and protesting against a clinic, The Associated Press reported. Ted Weiselberg, director of the Women's Choice clinic, described the distinction as "preposterous."

Yielding to public pressure and a series of class-action lawsuits, the Ford Motor Company today announced the largest recall by a single auto maker, asking that the owners of 8.7 million cars and trucks bring them to dealers for replacement of ignition switches that might cause fires. The recall covers the bulk of Ford's vehicles for 1988 through 1992 model years as well as a few early 1993 model cars.

Congress passed a $160 billion spending bill today, assuring that vast swaths of Government that had closed, reopened, closed again and reopened again during the long budget wars will stay open the remainder of fiscal 1996, now a bare five months. The House vote was 399 to 25. The Senate approved the bill 88 to 11.

Boy, 6, Charged in Beating