September 14, 2000

Former Los Alamos scientist Wen Ho Lee leaves court a free man after pleading guilty to single charge of mishandling nuclear secrets; Judge James A Parker apologizes to him for prosecutors' conduct in case; government virtually abandons its case against Lee, who spent nine months in prison awaiting trial that will now never take place; Judge Parker says he improperly denied bail to Lee because he was 'led astray' by executive branch; judge implicitly singles out Atty Gen Janet Reno, Energy Sec Bill Richardson and senior officials in Clinton White House for what he says was questionable indictment and for misleading him about Lee's supposedly deceptive behavior and then for ignoring his urgings that goverment ease 'demeaning, unnecessarily punitive conditions' under which Lee was being held; Atty Gen Reno and FBI Director Louis J Freeh are unapologetic about actions of prosecutors and agents; photos (M)

Apple Computer introduces beta version of its new Mac OS X (10) operating system software, which is based on Unix operating system and has a new interface, called Aqua; people who pay $29.95 for chance to find bugs and glitches in this test version will be surveyed by company for comment; photo (M)

Ann Powers reviews concert by Sting on Great Lawn in Central Park; photo (M)

On Wall Street, Chase Manhattan has long been considered an investment banking also-ran, disparaged by rivals as a declasse commercial bank. Now, with its proposed $30.9 billion purchase of J. P. Morgan, which was officially announced, Chase hopes that it will finally break into the club of financial firms with enduring global influence. Chase executives argue that the combination of Chase's broad base of customers with Morgan's exclusive clientele and financial expertise will prevent the two banks from being left behind in the race to determine which firms will dominate corporate finance.

After years of false starts, Apple Computer introduced its first radically changed operating system since the original Macintosh entered the market in 1984. The much-anticipated new system, called Mac OS X, was released to the public in an evaluation version for $29.95.