New Jersey Devils beat Florida Panthers, 4-3, and lead Stanley Cup playoff series, 1-0; photo (M)

Devils Start Fast, Then Manage to Survive Panthers

New York Mets beat Philadelphia Phillies, 2-1; photo (M)

Reed Gets Things Set Up Nicely And Mets Just Follow His Lead

Floyd Norris column on Palm Inc, unit of 3Com Corp, focuses on vanishing profits for 3Com Corp and absurd prices for Palm stock; says asking price for Palm shares started around $15, but underwriters pushed it up to $38 when Palm went public in March; holds shares traded at $165 the first day and are now down to $34, while 3Com's price is also down; says excluding Palm, 3Com used to report quarterly profits of around $100 million on revenue of about $1.3 billion; says 3Com expects revenue to be about half that level, and hopes profits wil return in 2001; graph (M)

Palm's Saga: A Tale of Vanishing Profits and Absurd Prices

Ben Brantley reviews Broadway musical The Wild Party, inspired by Joseph Moncure March's narrative poem of Prohibition era; production, season's second musical with same title, is by Michael John LaChiusa and George C Wolfe; Mandy Patinkin, Toni Collette and Eartha Kitt star; photos (M)

Having Fun Yet, Jazz Babies?

Harvey Araton, in Sports of The Times column, holds that Ray Lucas should be given every chance to win starting quarterback job because New York Jets are rebuilding; photo (M)

Sports of The Times; Sweep Up The Deck: Start Lucas

 Politics in Peru  Peruvians are asking how Alejandro Toledo, a man with no experience in high-stakes politics, managed to set the country afire with a powerful challenge to Alberto Fujimori. NEWS ANALYSIS, PAGE A3

INSIDE

US House, 274-110, approves legislation that would curtail ambitious plans to open FM airwaves to hundreds of new low-power stations for churches, community groups and schools; legislation was marked by bitter debate in which its Republican supporters accused officials of Federal Communications Commission of violating criminal law that forbids government agencies from lobbying Congress; FCC officials deny they violated any laws; they say legislation marked first time in agency's 65-year-history that chamber of Congress stripped Commission of its authority to oversee portion of radio spectrum; bill, which is opposed by Clinton administration, moves to Senate (M)

House Clears Bill to Curb Plans for FM

Recent tumble in technology stocks makes some employees in thick of dot-com whirlwhind look warily over their shoulders, as stocks of many new-economy companies plummet; people question whether they made mistake by giving up security of big salary for stock options that are not worth much anymore; in much-heralded exodus from old-line companies to dot-com startups in recent years, while some voyagers have found great wealth, others are finding that promised land does not offer the riches or satisfaction they had expected; examples cited (M)

Some Enticed by Dot-Coms Now Have Second Thoughts

New York State Supreme Court Justice William J Davis blocks New York City from awarding $104 million in contracts to Virginia company chosen by Giuliani administration to spearhead its landmark welfare-to-work programs, ruling that there is 'compelling evidence that contracting process has been corrupted; ruling spurs company, Maximus, to announce that it will suspend its fledgling operations in city; ruling throws into confusion nearly $500 million worth of contracts that had been awarded to Maximus and other companies; Davis adopts findings of Comptroller Alan G Hevesi, who challenged propriety of Maximus contracts; Davis agrees that Maximus had improper access to top city officials and had misled city about role played in its bid by former top Giuliani aide, Richard J Schwartz (M)

Judge's Ruling Bars Contracts In Welfare Plan

New York City decides not to spray malathion, pesticide it used against mosquitoes last year, in its campaign to prevent another outbreak of West Nile virus, and to use helicopter spraying only as a last resort; next week, city will begin effort to kill mosquitoes before they hatch, and if neighborhoods do become infested, officials will opt for three other insecticides sprayed primarily by trucks; city plans aggressive effort to kill mosquito larvae, and it will drop millions of tiny larvae-eating fish, so-called mosquitofish, into city's waste treatment plants; photo (M)

Mosquito Program Favors Prevention Over Pesticide Use

Some of world's leading telecommunications companies have been battling for licenses to operate new generation of mobile phones and other wireless devices in Britain--something seen as precursor to wider war of airwaves of Europe; from starting price of $800 million, value of those licenses has rocked to enormous figures, reflecting calculation among mobile phone operators that new wireless generation will eclipse anything booming wireless market has seen so far; when 124th round of bidding closed on April 13, bids for five licenses totaled $30.54 billion, compared with $29 billion on March 12; MCI Worldcom becomes most prominent bidder to drop out of race because of high bids; at stake are licenses with 20-year terms, payable over 10 years, to use new broadband wireless technology permitting Internet access at speeds 40 to 200 times faster than those now available, with capacity to attract far more users and wider variety of applications; leader of Class B licenses is BT3G, wireless division of British Telecomunications, which has offered $7.9 billion, beating earlier bid of $7.7 billion by Vodafone Airtouch; graph (M)

Up for Auction: Wireless Phones In a New Britain

 G.M. Profit Declines 2% But Still Beats Forecasts  Profit at General Motors edged down 2 percent in the first quarter as an unexpected turnaround in its international operations was not enough to offset unusually heavy discounting in the United States and rising costs at its Hughes Electronics subsidiary. Despite the decline, the results beat Wall Street forecasts.    In the United States, G.M. continued raising sticker prices slightly in the first quarter but offered so many discounts that the average price for which it was able to sell a vehicle actually declined 0.7 percent. [Page C2.]

BUSINESS DIGEST

Much-heralded settlement last month in which Smith & Wesson agreed to broad restrictions on way it makes and sells handguns appears to be in trouble, with company revising its position on several of deal's key provisions; government officials now acknowledge that company is offering new, far less expansive interpretation of settlement that government officials once portrayed as major new step in gun control; Clinton administration officials acknowledge that while new interpretation is far different from their own, they insist agreement will stand; photo of 'clarification' that Smith & Wesson posts on its Web site (M)

BIGGEST GUNMAKER REVISES THE RULES OF PACT WITH U.S.

A modest rebound in technology stocks vanished in the afternoon as the Nasdaq composite index fell for a fourth consecutive day, dragging a broad swath of other shares down with it.    The Nasdaq finished the day down 92.85 points, or 2.5 percent, to 3,676.78. The index is now 27.2 percent below its March 10 peak, firmly in bear-market territory.  

Nasdaq Declines For a Fourth Day

New York Jets send their second pick in first round of National Football League draft (16th over all) and their second-round pick (No 48) to San Francisco for 49ers' first-round pick (12th over all); Jets have 12th, 13th, 18th and 27th picks in first round (M)

Jets Get 12th Pick in Draft From 49ers

New York State lawmakers are nearing agreement on plan to increase school aid by as much as $1.1 billion, in what would be state's largest annual increase for education spending; are also close to deal that will continue for at least another year program to provide prekindergarten classes to all 4-year-olds and to reduce class sizes in early grades, at cost of about $200 million; lawmakers agree to increase tuition assistance for college students by total of $141 million over two years (M)

Deal Is Near On Record Rise For Education

Nasdaq composite index drops 92.85 points, or 2.5 percent, at 3,676.78; index is 27.2 percent below its March 10 peak, firmly in what is regarded as bear-market territory; Dow Jones industrial average drops 201.58 points, or 1.8 percent, to 10,923.55; Standard & Poor's 500-stock index falls 26.66 points, or 1.82 percent, to 1,440.51; graph; chart (M)

Nasdaq Gasps for Air, Then Faints Away Again, by 2.5%

Brooklyn Rabbi Ronald Barry and his wife, Miriam, travel to Tonco, Italy, to meet Nicola Trevisan and his family; Barry in 1992 donated some of his bone marrow to save Trevisan, who was 10 years old at time; transplant represented boy's only chance to survive approaching leukemia; map; photo (M)

A Gift of Life Bridges 2 Cultures and Families; After 8 Years of Letters, Brooklyn Rabbi Visits Italy and Meets the Boy He Helped

International Coffee & Tea LLC, which operates 32 Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf coffee outlets in US and 21 in Malaysia, expects to generate $100 million in worldwide sales this year; Victor Sassoon, Singaporean entrepreneur who bought Asian franchise for Coffee Bean, chain of gourmet coffee shops based in Los Angeles, explains his corporate strategy; Sasson hopes to be as successful as Starbucks Corp; chart; photos (M)

Wake Up and Smell the Profits; A Singaporean Sees the World as His Coffee Cup

American Federation of Teachers, facing growing national movement to impose tougher standards on teachers, will propose national test and rigorous new standards for those who want to become teachers; proposal, a departure from traditional union opposition to increased teacher testing, comes amid heightened worries from educators, parents and politicians about declining quality of nation's teaching force and those entering it; about a third of all teachers lack a major or minor in subjects they teach (M)

UNION IS URGING A NATIONAL TEST FOR NEW TEACHERS

Construction of seven windmills will begin on two farms in Madison, NY; it is largest effort in East to turn energy in air into electricity; $16 million project is being built by PG&E Generating; customers for power from wind farm are expected to be companies and institutions that are willing to tack on additional 5 or 10 percent to electric bills in return for being able to say they are using some power generated without pollution; map; rendering (M)

Company Aims to Reap the Wind As a Clean Source of Electricity

Mary Harron's sleekly brilliant screen adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis's notorious 1991 novel pares away most of the book's gore to portray the main character's homicidal butchery as a high-gloss fantasy. The movie's chic blend of satire, comedy and horror is anchored in a star-making performance by Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman, a fashion-obsessed late-80's Wall Street hotshot who goes on a killing spree. Reese Witherspoon, Chloe Sevigny, Samantha Mathis and Cara Seymour give dazzling cameo performances as the unfortunate women in his life. The movie's message about a soulless surface-obsessed society still applies. &#151; Stephen Holden

Murderer! Fiend! (But Well Dressed)

Cuban flag is hoisted high by Cuban exiles in a temporary victory over governments of Fidel Castro and United States as Elian Gonzalez's relatives first defy a deadline to give up boy and then win an emergency stay that will delay any action for at least next few days; as 4,000 demonstrators cheer and chant in streets of Little Havana outside house where Elian is staying, boy's relatives ignore order by Atty Gen Janet Reno to take Elian from home by 2 pm and deliver him to nearby airport; lawyers for great uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez, obtain emergency, temporary stay from United States Court of Appeals for 11th Circuit, one that prevents Elian's father from taking boy back to Cuba; photo (M)

Cuban's Family Defies Reno; Court Issues a Stay

Question of coal ash and how to dispose of it becomes subject of hot environmental debate; more than 100 million tons of coal ash, which is what is left over by coal-burning power plants, are produced each year, and until now, it has been treated as essentially benign, regulated only by states and disposed of in landfills, storage ponds and even surface mines under uneven laws that are often less strict than those that govern household trash; in last several weeks, Environmental Protection Agency has signalged its concern that ash may be more toxic than was previously understood; within Clinton administration, vigorous discussion is under way about what to do, and White House could decide by end of this month whether to end 20-year-old exemption that protected ash from strict federal solid waste regulations; electric utilities industry, which contends there is no need for new restrictions, lobbies hard in Washington in hope of heading off any change; coal companies want to continue putting coal ash back into holes gouged out by strip mining; people in communities like Farmersburg, Indiana, are concerned that coal ash is going to contaminate their wells; photos (L)

Plan to Dump Coal Ash Adds Salt to a Wound

Clyde Haberman column notes that for several years, League for Hard of Hearing has urged New Yorkers to shush themselves for 60 seconds as part of event called International Noise Awareness Day, which fell on April 12 at 2: 15 pm; says Times Square at that time was about same as it is most days; notes that each year higher percentage of people are failing league's hearing tests (M)

Seeking Mute Button For Urban Din

Patrick Frank Surtain II is an American professional football cornerback for the Denver Broncos of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the Alabama Crimson Tide and was selected ninth overall by the Broncos in the 2021 NFL draft.

Patrick Surtain II, American football player

Patrick_Surtain_II

Phillip Walter Katz was a computer programmer best known as the co-creator of the ZIP file format for data compression, and the author of PKZIP, a program for creating zip files that ran under DOS.

Phil Katz, American computer programmer, co-created the zip file format (born 1962)

Phil_Katz

Wilfrid James Mannion was an English professional footballer who played as an inside forward, making over 350 senior appearances for Middlesbrough. He also played international football for England. With his blonde hair, he was nicknamed "The Golden Boy".

April 14, 2000

Headlines from April 14, 2000

Devils Start Fast, Then Manage to Survive Panthers

Reed Gets Things Set Up Nicely And Mets Just Follow His Lead

Palm's Saga: A Tale of Vanishing Profits and Absurd Prices

Having Fun Yet, Jazz Babies?

Sports of The Times; Sweep Up The Deck: Start Lucas

Billboard 200

No Strings Attached

Supernatural

Romeo Must Die -- The Album

Unleash The Dragon

Opposite Of H2O

Notable Births

Notable Deaths

Historical Context for April 14, 2000