6 LONGISLANDPRESS.COM • JANUARY 2021
IN THE NEWS
WEB BRIEFS LI AT A GLANCE
SUFFOLK LEGIS.-ELECT ARRESTED
Suffolk County Legislator-elect Nicholas Caracappa
of Selden was arrested on Dec. 9 for alleged domestic
violence less than a month before he is scheduled to
be sworn into office, Suffolk County police said.
Officers responded to the 53-year-old’s Hawkins
Road home, where he was charged with first-degree
criminal contempt, a felony, and a misdemeanor
count of criminal obstruction of breathing related to
a domestic incident, police said. Judge James Saladino
released Caracappa without bail following his initial
appearance at First District Court in Central Islip.
“If you think you are going to get 50 percent and
give it to a stupid douchebag, I will kill you
first,” Caracappa told the victim,
according to court documents
that authorities filed in
the case. Authorities
said he also
“grabbed and
pushed the
victim…up
against a
wall and
squeezed
her neck
and prevented
her from
breathing.”
Caracappa was elected in November. He is scheduled
to be sworn in on Jan. 4 and is due back in court on
Jan. 21.
-Timothy Bolger
MEEKS FIRST BLACK FOREIGN AFFAIRS
CHAIR
U.S. House of Representatives Democrats elected
Greg Meeks on Thursday as the next chairman of
the House Foreign Affairs Committee, a position
in which he is expected to work closely with President
elect Joe Biden’s administration on the Iran
nuclear deal and other issues.
Meeks, 67, who will be the first Black American to
lead the committee, said he planned “a new way of
doing business,” including working to rejoin the
Iran nuclear pact and World Health Organization,
and seeking to regain Congress’ traditional control
over the right to declare war. The Queens congressman
represents New York’s 5th congressional district,
which includes Inwood, Valley Stream, and
Elmont.
“Not only will we need to re-engage with a world
that has felt the marked absence of U.S. global
leadership, but we must also rethink traditional
approaches to foreign policy,” Meeks said in a
statement.
When the new Congress is seated in January, the
11-term House member will succeed fellow U.S.
Rep. Eliot Engel (D-Bronx), who lost a Democratic
primary this year to a more progressive challenger.
-Reuters
ID TO AIR GILGO CASE SPECIAL
How corruption in the Suffolk County Police Department
weighed on the investigation into the unsolved
Gilgo Beach serial murders will be the focus of a TV
special and podcast coming soon to Investigation
Discovery.
Investigative
journalists Billy
Jensen, who helped revive
the Long Island Press in 2003, and
Alexis Linkletter, a true crime documentary producer
from Nissequogue, teamed up on a seven-part
podcast dubbed Unraveled: Long Island Serial Killer,
to be released on Jan. 27, followed by a two-part TV
special scheduled to air on Memorial Day.
“We’re investigating the investigation,” Jensen
said. “We’re not starting with Shannan Gilbert,
as everybody does. We’re starting with the police
department.”
ID says the duo will expose the untold story of why
the case remains unsolved. They promise new revelations
stemming from Christopher Loeb, the man
who former Suffolk Police Chief James Burke was
convicted of beating while Loeb was handcuffed in
a police station.
-TB
CUOMO EYES DISABILITY SERVICE CUTS
Following a decade of budget cuts, Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s
office is proposing yet another round of slashes
to service providers who care for New Yorkers who
have intellectual and developmental disabilities in
the 2021 budget — a move that caregivers say will
devastate them and the people they care for.
In an effort to manage the budget shortfall spurred
by the coronavirus pandemic, the state is asking the
Office for People with Developmental Disabilities
to reduce its budget by 5 percent for the next fiscal
year, the latest in a long history of cuts to services for
developmentally disabled New Yorkers.
These types of services have seen a multitude of cuts
over the past decade, including a 6 percent budget cut
to OPWDD in 2012. In the last year alone, the agency has
had to impose a 20 percent withholding on bills for statepaid
services, and change the system of
billing for residential f a c i l i t i e s ,
resulting in losses of $500
million
for care providers
throughout
2020, according to the
New York City Family Advocacy
Information Resource.
Advocates fear the cuts signify a backslide towards the
mid-20th century when people with developmental
disabilities were treated as undesirables — most
famously illustrated by the horrific conditions uncovered
at the Willowbrook State School on Staten
Island in the 1980s.
“People are fearing that we’re going backwards, back
to the days of Willowbrook,” said New York State
Assemblywoman Melissa Miller (R-Atlantic Beach).
“And I have to be honest, it’s certainly starting to feel
that way.”
-Ben Verde
NY SENATE RACES CERTIFIED
A pair of New York State Senate races that hinged on
Suffolk County Board of Elections workers counting
the unprecedented number of absentee ballots mailed
in due to the coronavirus pandemic have been certified.
Republican former Islip Town Tax Receiver Alexis
Weik ousted freshman New York State Sen. Monica
Martinez (D-Brentwood) a month after Election
Day once absentee ballots were counted. And New
York State Assemblyman Anthony Palumbo (R-New
Suffolk) beat Democrat Laura Ahearn in the race to
replace retiring longtime state Sen. Kenneth LaValle
(R-Port Jefferson).
“I didn’t think it was going to happen,” Weik said,
while Martinez may be plotting a comeback in
the 2022 elections. Palumbo said, “The honor to
stand here to succeed Senator LaValle is almost
unspeakable.”
-TB
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