Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • 2

2 i Section 1 Chidago Tribune, Friday', October 28, 1983 From Pago 1 Double-nickel speed limit isn't worth dime; Granger i I I I THE SACRED 55-mile-an-hour speed limit on highways should never have happened, as anyone who drives any distance at all knows. But like Prohibition, another absolutely rotten idea, the silly national speed limit sits there like a cow on the tracks long after it should have moseyed on. Inevitably, any voice raised against our wimpy speed limit will be met by a chorus from the professional and amateur do-gooders of the Republic who point out that it saves lives. It may but I also think it may contribute to taking lives. And because it was never intended to save lives, why raise that argument at all? PRESIDENT NIXON bludgeoned the states into accepting the 55-mile-an-hour limit by threatening to withhold federal highway funds if they did not comply.

His purpose in proposing the speed limit was the same as that in his proposal that outdoor lighting of buildings be limited to save fuel during an oil crisis. Remember how the editorial writers pounded us into lunchmeat with cogent arguments for darker streets, darker corridors, colder living rooms and people would solemnly report, "The National-; Safety Council predicted 400 Americans would be-. slaughtered on the nation's highways during the long Labor Day weekend starting at 6 p.m. Friday and that et cetera." The fact was that as interstate highway systems grew in popularity, the death rate for the vehicles on the nighways at a given time on such weekend often declined. I- There is no common sense used in the national! speed limit.

There's a two-lane stretch of road-near my house where the speed limit is 55. There is also a modern, divided, articulated and cer-. tified four-lane interstate system near my house that is 50 times better than that two-lane stretch," and the speed limit is the same. OUT IN ARIZONA or Colorado, where you can drive all day without seeing a cow or hearing a discouraging word, they have the same speed limit as folks Jammed together on the New Jersey, Turnpike or humping around Chicago on the Tri- State. Madness, all of it.

The states, obviously, should set their own speed limits. In any case, trucks should not be allowed to go as fast as cars, especially as tracks get bigger and bigger and cars get dinkier and dinkier. Like Prohibition, the 55-mile-an-hour law is i widely ignored, creating a climate of lawlessness- slow-moving cars, all to make American energ; self-sufficient by 1980? You dont? Well, cost more as a result. For the first time, truck behemoths are permitted to travel at exactly the same speed on highways as teensy little cars constructed of paste and promises. It is terrifying out there for car drivers, rolling along an interstate at an officially condoned 59 miles per hour with an 18-wheel Peterbilt dogging your tail lights and a Godfearing Greyhound swooping out into the passing lane.

Last summer, I rented a car and drove from southern England to northern Scotland. It was a dinky little Italian car. but what a pleasure to move smartly along at 73 miles an hour while trucks, in the slow lane, contentedly marched along at 60. A pleasure and a feeling of safe driving. Trucks should not be allowed to go as fast as cars, period.

AND AGAIN, THE prime argument In favor of 55 comes from the likes of the National Safety Council, which wasn't involved in the logic behind the original decision at all but has now claimed the crusade for its very own. The NSC is to 55 what the Woman's Christian Temperance Union was to the Volstead Act. In my early reporting experience, the NSC was the darling of the news media on slow holiday weekends when the only news came from the safety council and its grim statistical watch on "the nation's highways. Each Friday, the news on the roads and an against the guvminC-mentality that pervades other areas of citizehv state relations. A national "underground" race is iieiu every year ueiweeu iiew ivik aim u.n.r iiuo t- .1 I oa -J mittedly, 1974 was a long time ago.

But today all the corridors are lit again, the Christmas lights are unthreatened, I have read many editorials praising the Chicago program for lighting up buildings and bridges, and the Reagan administration has acknowledged that America ain't never gonna be energy self-sufficient and we' should Just as soon forget about it. So, friends, why are we hanging on to the last vestige of the oil crisis, the turtle-paced national, speed limit? ARGUMENTS FOR dropping the limit abound: It slows commerce about a quarter of our goods are routed by truck and makes everything vcur wuuier muue una uiu 111 iiuuib aitu kui- Spilotro not guilty in murders By Marianne Taylor ANTHONY SPILOTRO, reputed overseer of.the Chicago mob in Las Vegas, was acquitted Thursday in two 1962 murders in a case that prosecutors concede posed problems for them from the beginning. Criminal Court Judge Thomas Maloney ruled there had been no independent evidence to support the accusations of Spilotro's former boyhood friend, informant Frank Cullotta, that Spilotro had helped carry out the murders 21 years ago of James Miraglia and William McCarthy, both 24. J'Frank Cullotta undoubtedly knew anyone and everyone engaged in criminal acts in the Ogden and Grand and Grand and Harlem areas and far beyond," Judge Maloney said. "It is not inconceivable that Cullotta could have fit the name of any person other than Spilotro in the scheme of the Miraglia and i McCarthy murders." WHEN MALONEY Said lie was "compelled to enter a finding of not guilty," Spilotro turned to shake hands with his two lawyers.

He then left the courtroom with his wife. Spilotro, Indicted on the charges earlier this year, had posted $1 million bond to remain free. "Just as it's difficult to prosecute a 21-year-old murder case, it's difficult to establish the credibility of a witness like Cullotta," said William Kunkle first assistant state's attorney. But Kunkle said the case was one that demanded prosecution. "When a witness comes forward and there is sufficient evidence to indict, we owe 'a debt to the public to prosecute the case and attempt to secure a conviction.

It's simply a very difficult case." IN THE four-day bench trial, defense lawyers Herbert Barsy and Oscar Goodman continually prodded Cullotta. 44, to recite a litany of his own criminal misdeeds including perjury and argued that Cullotta haa a motive to he about Spilotro. 45. "All your life you've been jealous of Tony Spilotro, haven't you?" defense lawyer Herbert Barsy asked. "Did you tell them federal authorities that, one way or the other, you'd give them Tony Spilotro?" As be has in other Cook County trials, Cullotta testified as an munized witness who Is in federal protective custody.

stnnned onlv once bv our alert law enforcement officers and the CB radio boom was directly attributed to attempts Dy motorists to sun wet speed limit. If it's OK to go back to lighting up the Wrigley-Building, the Picasso and Michigan Avenue, can't we all go back to 65? TJ Anthony Spilotro AT THE HEART of the prosecution's case was Cullotta's testimony that Spilotro had confessed to him his involvement in the McCarthy and Miraglia slayings one week after-May 14, 1962, the day the men's bodies were found in the trunk of a car. "Tony Spilotro told me Billy McCarthy was tortured," Cullotta said. "His head was put in a vise. His eye popped out of his head." He said McCarthy was tortured to make him name the man who had helped him commit three Elmwood Park murders that had angered mob bosses.

Cullotta said Miraglia was abducted from a North Side tavern and strangled. "The witness, Cullotta," Judge Maloney said, "admitted to a life of crime that was extraordinary, unremitting and unabated for 30 He admitted to the commission of two murders and involvement in two others. "Federal and state authorities have a right to accept as true the statements and testimony of Frank Cullotta." said Maloney, referring to Cullotta unique position as a mob informant. IN THE CLOSING moments of the case, Cullotta's brother, Joseph, 36, took the stand as a defense witness and testified briefly that his brother's reputation in the community "for truthfulness" was "very bad." i Cullotta said he was told, in 1982, that Spilotro had offered a contract for his life. It was then that Cullotta agreed to become a government informant, he said.

"The FBI planted a lie in his mind that Tony Spilotro was going to cause him some harm," said Spilotro's lawyer, Goodman. "He's testifying as a prisoner, in a prison in which he encompassed himself." ISljd33jD3 uu 'QiflsuTseOB IB EE if JvJ Ln Brzeczek BRZECZEK, in contrast, traded angry gibes with Washington in the mayoral campaign, suggesting that publiq safety could be jeopardized if some of Washington associates gained control of the Police Department. Thursday, Brzeczek rekindled that feud by opining that Washington's campaign had generated "hysterical rhetoric." Although he taped a controversial" campaign commercial tor Byrne in the Democratic primary, Brzeczek acknowledged that he favored Republican Bernard Epton over Washington in the general election. ri thought he was the better of the two," Brzeczek said of Epton, who rolled up overwhelming majorities in the Northwest and Southwest Side wards on which Brzeczek is counting next year. Brzeczek's candidacy may place Washington in a bind, because he had threatened to lead a black boy From short term investments to long term investments and beyond, GreatAmerican has all the banking you'lfever need.

Visit your neighbor-nood office today. That's all it takes to become a GreatAmerican. iContlnued from page 1 Brzeczek add to the GOP's suburban base are Democrats on Chicago's Northwest and Southwest Sides, who will be drawn by Brzeczek's Polish name and his law-and-order image. He lives on the Northwest Side. The GOP may have gained its first 'convert in Brzeczek himself.

He acknowledged that he has chosen a Democratic ballot in every primary in which he has voted since 1966. BUT BRZECZEK. who served Democratic Mayor Jane Byrne for three years, maintains that he is a Republican at heart and has supported GOP candidates in all general elections. "Philosophically. I adhere to the Republican Party," Brzeczek told reporters, refusing requests for specifics on issues that would illustrate his point.

The Republican leaders who wooed Brzeczek, however, care less about his past voting habits than his ability to win votes where Daley could be most vulnerable. Some Northwest and Southwest Side voters still harbor a grudge against Daley for challenging Byrne earlier this year, a move they think split the white vote, paving the way for a Washington victory. cott of local Democratic candidates aligned with Aid. Edward Vrdolyak 110th. DALEY COULD HAVE been a tar- get of such a move, but it is doubtful that the mayor would want to elect Brzeczek, particularly because the former police superintendent hinted Make your money work harder for you, the GreatAmerican Way.

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And a Retirement Account, which pays high interest toward your future and offers tax relief now. And now, GreatAmerican even inursaay mat ne wins, wasning ton might be his next target. "Only time will Brzeczek Deposits Deposits Deposits Yarns from from from' $4,999 $25,000 PLUS 6 9.12 9.54 9.12 954 9.12 9.54 Months RATt VltLO RAU TlLD RATI YltlD 12-23 9.56 1002 981 10 29 10.06 10.57 Months Rate vlo Kate yield Rate yield 24-35 10.39 1093 1064 1 1.21 10.89 U.48 Months ykid rate rate yield 36-47 1069 U.26 1094 U.54 11.19 11.82 Months RAI1 mD vlLD yitLD 48-59 10.93 II. 53 11.18 "81 11.43 12.08 Months Rate yield rate yield rate yield 11.13 1 1 .75, 11.38 1203 1163 12.31 60 Months rate yield rate yield rate yield said when asked if he would use the state's attorney's office as a stepping sione 10 run tor mayor. for McCahey at Lakeside Travel Agency until it went out of business in ADril.

1982. Tylenol Testimony showed thai Lewis and his wife moved to New York City on Sept. 6, 1982, before the Tylenol murders occurred on Sept. 29 and 30 Continued from page 1 ana ua. i.

Oh Oct. 6. Lewis wrote an anony Ettactivt Annual YWdt Indicattd to chwt Tbu role avoilable for deposits of $25,000 or more, federal regulations require a substantial interest penalty for eariy withdrawal of time deposits. Rotes subject to change at ony time. mous letter to Johnson and Johnson in which he demanded that $1 million be wired to a Chicago bank account cnn tha lrillino provides full service stock brokerage, Interest is compounded monthly on certificates 6 months ond more.

THE NEXT week, an FBI invest! RATI For current interest rotes on these ond other occounts coll: 1-80O-942-1 625 gation identified Lewis as the author of the letter and a warrant was issued for his arrest. Following played on the fear generated by the Tylenol deaths in an attempt to carry out his extortion scheme. In his final words to the, Jury Thursday afternoon, Webb Attacked the defense theory as "ridiculous" ana unleashed a strong barrage against Lewis. "The man who wrote that letter Is a vicious and mean person," Webb told the Jury. "The man who wrote that letter is an evil and a depraved opportunist who was trying to turn a tragedy to his own benefit." THEN, TURNING from the Jury and stabbing a finger at Lewis, Webb said, "That man is you, James Lewis." Lewis was a tax consultant in Kansas City.

before coming to Chicago with his wife In December. 1961. Lewis worked at a series of temporary Jobs, and his wife worked massive manhunt, he was captured in a public library in New York City on Dec. 12. In May, while awaiting trial here.

Lewis was convicted Kansas City oi man iraua in a credit card scheme. Evidence about the con viction and another apparent extor tion scheme were submitted to the Fstf sial Ssvmc3 Jury in the Tylenol case. Lewis was never charged in con nection with the Tylenol murders, Member FSLIC which remain unsolved (Thica0 (Tribune (USPS 104-000) 27 Off (CC LOCATIONS Main Omca-OAK MRU, In CM Port Ma 1001 Id Si 60X1315 33 MOO CMtCAOO (lOOn J30 MrfcajW 6060I3IJ J3404I4. JOO So VxW Or a0OJI7 4l ITO CMC AGO. KMtfflfaf 6063631 476-WJ.

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