January 6, 2005

Rutgers University women's basketball team defeats Louisiana State University, 51-49, in overtime; photos (M)

Alessandra Stanley reviews new CBS reality show Wickedly Perfect; photo (M)

Eastchester becomes first town in New York to end health benefits to domestic partners of its employees; town's civil service union and police union agree to drop coverage, saying their members have more pressing concerns; two employees who made use of benefits will be allowed to continue to do so, but new employees will not be eligible; town officials say they took action to save money; idea of domestic partner benefits had been condemned by one local group as effort by gay activists to promote same-sex marriage; gay rights groups see town's decision as dangerous step backward that could eat away at policies that have become common in government and private sector; 11 states, including New York, provide domestic partner benefits for public employees, as do New York City and 128 counties around country (M)

Two teams of researchers report that reducing levels of certain protein secreted by body may be as powerful a tool in slowing heart disease and preventing heart attacks and cardiac-related death as lowering cholesterol; this is strongest evidence yet that protein--known as CRP, for C-reactive protein--plays role in heart disease; other heart disease researchers caution that more work is needed to prove that CRP directly causes heart disease; new studies involved only people with severe heart disease; most researchers agree that it remains unknown whether healthy people would benefit from reducing their CRP level; new studies are published in The New England Journal of Medicine; photo (M)

Race for Brooklyn district attorney is laced with confusing intrigue, including claims of lies, libel, treachery, abuse of power and worse; longtime Dist Atty Charles J Hynes, who is seeking his fifth term, has reputation for prickliness; political adversaries say he has history of prosecuting those who challenge him at ballot box; many damaging accusations against him have been made over years by John Kennedy O'Hara, disbarred lawyer who was successfully prosecuted by Hynes, and has vowed to run Hynes out of office; photos (M)