Now the city wants to reduce parking on the strip. But that’s infuriated local car owners who have proposed their own solution: adding bike lanes.

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Peddler whispered designer names to shoppers snaking along the sidewalk, heralding bargains still to be had – even if many storefronts were indefinitely shuttered.

A vendor named Tun stopped briefly to show a laminated card with pictures of designer bags for sale, and said he’d be right back before slipping around the corner. Reappearing minutes later, he pulled a small package from his jacket and unwrapped a knockoff Louis Vuitton handbag.

A genuine bag of the same size runs $300 to $600 in city boutiques. Tun’s price: $35.

Asked why he immigrated from Vietnam to work on the streets of New York, Tun gushed, “It’s the Big Apple: very, very sweet!”

‘Counterfeit Triangle’

It was anything but sweet the day before for those peddling designer knockoffs from Chinatown storefronts. On Feb. 26, the mayor’s Special Enforcement Unit and cops from the Fifth Precinct seized about $1 million in bogus goods and closed 32 shops in what Bloomberg dubbed the “counterfeit triangle” of Canal, Baxter and Centre streets.

Targeting property owners George and Carl Terranova, police got a restraining order to keep vendors out and began a lawsuit, citing building code violations. The Terranovas, who promptly issued a statement promising to cooperate with the city, must demonstrate that new tenants will sell legitimate goods before the stores can open again, officials said.

Legit Businesses Hurting

The closure of the storefront operations didn’t stop vendors like Tun, who said his boss brings in containers of knockoff goods worth thousands to resell on the street. On a good day, Tun will make $80, from which he pays $15 daily rent for a private room.

Nearby, the Lucky Stone shop was still open, displaying water fountains and carved stone dragons, giving some life to the street amid closed graffiti-laden metal gates on neighboring stores.

Robert, the shop owner, said he was grateful that police supervisors allowed him to reopen after determining his business was legitimate. He did, however, lose a day and a half of business.

“It’s slow today, too,” he said, explaining the lack of open stores had cut foot traffic.

Sitting inside a Centre Street kiosk, the “newspaper man” as he identified himself, said complained that innocent businesspeople suffered when cops shut the entire block for the raid.

“They lose their livelihood. The little guys always suffer,” he said.

In one of the closed shops, an NYPD detective stopped packing confiscated handbags, belts and wallets to talk with two women standing on the other side of a metal barricade set up by authorities. The detective explained in Chinese that the women could have access to their grocery and bamboo shop once they return with letters of permission from various city agencies.

“No illegal!” one of the women declared. She rubbed her eyes with her fists – apparently expressing her sadness to be out of work.

Clear Consciences

Experiencing a different kind of disappointment were Sammie Jones and Patrice Eldridge who came from Texas hoping to find the same Prada bags they had picked up in Chinatown last year. Neither had any qualms with buying bogus bags.

“[The designers are] not really reimbursing the people that are making them. They’re getting made in sweatshops and it’s costing them nothing, then they’re selling them to us at 500 or 600 times a markup, so it doesn’t bother me at all to come to Chinatown and buy the knockoffs,” said Jones.

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“The trickster, the jester, there’s a long history of getting the attention of the king with the wise fool,” 38-year-old Ben Sheppard said.

He was leading the group just south of Houston Street through mid-morning traffic on Feb. 15: about half a dozen red-nosed fellow cycling enthusiasts dressed in colorful costumes, complete with curly wigs and tiny traffic cones atop their heads.

“Clowns instead of earnest politicians,” Sheppard declared enthusiastically while he waited for the light to go green again.

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Former convicts face many challenges after being released from prison. Click here to see Ana Toro’s multi-media report, which tells the stories of some former prisoners and profiles a transitional program aimed at bringing down high recidivism rates.

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Three young men followed 18-year-old Jesus Charriez and 21-year-old Luis Bermudez for several blocks, as they walked through Longwood on an October afternoon, the pair told police. The attackers yelled “faggot” and spit on the pair. Then, at 5 p.m. in front of a hair salon on the crowded corner of E. 163rd St. and Intervale Ave., they beat their victims, uninterrupted, for several minutes and stole a gold necklace and a cell phone.

Both Charriez and Bermudez ended up in the hospital with minor injuries. The police on the scene classified the crime as a robbery, with no mention of the anti-gay slurs that marked the incident.

The attack highlighted anti-gay feelings in the Bronx, where many gays hide their orientation out of fear. Although Bronx Borough President Aldolfo Carrion and U.S. Rep. Jose Serrano have condemned the incident, gay leaders called on more Bronx politicians to speak out against intolerance.

The attack changed the way Charriez views the neighborhood where he and Bermudez volunteer as a peer counselors at the Hispanic AIDS Forum, just a few blocks from where the assault took place.

“I call it my safe zone,” Charriez said. Since the attack, though, he has a hard time sleeping, and says it will be “a little bit difficult” to go out in the area.

Violent attacks are just one symptom of widespread anti-gay attitudes in the borough, Bronx gays say.

Alberto Antomnarchi, a 43-year-old Bronxite, has lived in all of New York’s boroughs except Staten Island, and he identified the Bronx as being particularly homophobic and closeted.

In the black or Puerto Rican community, being gay means “you lose your family; you lose respect in the community,” said Antomnarchi, who is Puerto Rican.

Family support is an issue for Mosey Diaz as well. “Even in my family, they make fun of the LGBT,” Diaz said, using the term for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

Diaz, who is 18 and a lifelong Bronx resident, worked for the Bronx Community Pride Center at a gay pride rally in Barretto Point Park.

“‘Oh, I like what you’re doing here,’” a man said to her, reading her “Bronx Pride” sign. “When he found out that it was LGBT,” Diaz said, “he was like, ‘That’s disgusting. I didn’t come here for that.’”

Still, Diaz said progress is being made in the Bronx: “It’s hostile, but the times have changed. It’s getting better.”

Diaz, who describes herself as “out” but not “open,” said that younger LGBT Bronx residents are increasingly willing to stop hiding their sexual orientation.

Reverend James Dusenbury is the pastor of In the Life Ministries, an interdenominational church on Commerce Avenue near Westchester Square that caters to LGBT parishioners. He agreed that coming out in the Bronx can be dangerous.

“Most people feel their safety is at risk, so they’ve got to live a closeted lifestyle,” Dusenbury said. “The only reason why I’m so openly gay is I want people to see I’m a regular person.”

The last time he reached out to another Bronx church, Dusenbury said, “They were not happy to hear from me.” Members of a neighboring church have called his church “the faggot church.”

As more gays live more openly in the Bronx, they’ll face increased aggression from straights, gay leaders believe.

“You will probably see an increase in homophobic language, in aggressive and sometimes violent behavior towards gay people,” said Heriberto Sanchez Soto, the executive director of the Hispanic AIDS Forum in New York.

When violence does occur, it often goes unreported by the victims, Soto said. Convincing victims to come forward is a challenge for gay advocates and leaders.

The Bronx’s rate of reported hate-crimes is almost three times lower than in the rest of the city. According to the NYPD hate crimes unit. Since January 1, 2006, only five anti-gay hate crimes were reported in the Bronx compared with 91 anti-gay hate crimes in the rest of New York.

Soto said that hate crimes go unreported more often in the Bronx because violence is seen as a normal part of life in the borough.

“It’s like New York City in the 70’s. We were all accustomed to all the violence, to the garbage in the streets,” Soto said. “‘Hey, this is New York City.’ Well, no, this should not be New York City; it should be better than this.”

Gay leaders also say that some politicians and members of the clergy share responsibility for widespread anti-gay sentiment.

“There is no tolerance in the borough for LGBT people,” said Lisa Winters, executive director of the Bronx Community Pride Center, an advocacy organization and gathering place for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender residents.

“We’ve begun to change that, but we have lots of work to do,” she continued. “We need our friends in the pulpit and elected and appointed officials to join with us in that effort. It’s embarrassing for the Bronx. The Bronx should be ashamed of itself.”

Winters named state Senator Ruben Diaz as one politician who could do more. Diaz opposes gay marriage, sued in an effort to prevent the city from financing a school for gay students, and tried to prevent the Gay Games from coming to New York, saying they could spread AIDS.

“He’s been very hateful and spiteful towards the LGBT in the Bronx,” Winters said. “He’s whipped people into frenzies.”

Diaz said that he is not anti-gay, and condemned the attack on Charriez and Bermudez, which he said he had not heard of.

“We need to protect people from hate crimes,” Diaz said. “I believe that anyone who does something like that should be subject to the maximum weight of the law. The police should spend any resource to go after them.”

After issuing his statement condemning the attack, Serrano said in an interview, “I don’t do any of this because it’s politically sound. On the contrary, some people think the politically sound thing to do is keep away.”

The congressman said his constituents understand that gays deserve to be able to walk down the street without being “picked on for their sexual orientation,” but added, “The problem is that so many elected officials get nervous about having to explain it, and so they’d rather not get involved. The biggest crime you can commit is the crime of silence.”

For their part, Charriez and Bermudez have refused to be silent.

They convinced police to reclassify their case as a hate crime after the initial police report made no mention of the slurs or the spitting. They also spoke out at a press conference held by the Hispanic AIDS Forum, which led to coverage on the evening news. Their experience has been reported by newspapers in Detroit and Nashville, putting a face on the debate over federal hate crime laws.

They say they spoke out for their own sake, but not just for themselves.

“We want to spread the word and make sure it doesn’t happen to anyone,” Charriez said.

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The Center on Media, Crime & Justice and CUNY’s John Jay College of Criminal Justice hosted the Third Annual Harry F. Guggenheim Symposium on Crime in America Dec. 3-4. This year’s theme, “Crime, Justice and Politics: Looking Ahead To 2008,” brought together politicians, educators, journalists and law enforcement officials to discuss crime and crime statistics – and how they’ll play a part in the upcoming presidential elections.

For video reports on the conference, click here.

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Three lawmakers have sued the state to demand that it keep the emergency room at Victory Memorial Hospital open, even if the rest of the medical center is forced to close down.

State Sen. Marty Golden (R–Bay Ridge), Rep. Vito Fossella (R–Bay Ridge) and Councilman Vincent Gentile (D–Bay Ridge) put aside partisan bickering on Tuesday to file a lawsuit against the Department of Health that seeks to reverse a state decision to close the financially strapped hospital.

“We have no other choice but to pursue legal action to force the state to do the right thing for our community,” said Fossella.

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Two candles encased in red glass, one with a gold cross imprinted on the front, burn in front of a lamppost on the corner of Nassau and Manhattan avenues in Greenpoint as a memorial to Stanislaw Mazur.

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The number of hate crimes in the city this year has reached more than 200 — a 20% increase compared to the same period last year. More than half of hate crimes nationwide are based on the victim’s race, followed by religion and sexual orientation.
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October and November are considered the best months to get a vaccination against influenza. Although the nasal spray is available, most New Yorkers who opt for the vaccine will get a needle in the arm. Dr. Jane R. Zucker, an assistant health commissioner for the city, joins us in our studio to discuss New York’s plan to ensure that 90% of its population over 65 gets the vaccine.

Producer: Megan Kelty

Reporters: Carolyn Nardiello, Laura Silver

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