Mayor’s brother holds up bank

Press, 20 December 1978, Page 9

Mayor’s brother holds up bank

NZPA-Reuter Cleveland A brother of the Mayor of 'Cleveland (Mr Dennis Kucintich) has been arrested for bank robbery just hours before the Mayor announced nearly half the police force would be laid off to help save the city from bankruptcy. The police said that Perry Kucinich, aged 22, was grabbed a few blocks away from the bank with a suitcase containing about SL'S3OOO. They said he walked into a city bank and passed a note to a teller demanding that the suitcase be filled with money. An embarrassed Mayor Kucinich, who is 32, said later his younger brother had been undergoing psychiatric treatment for years. The police said he robbed a branch of the Central Nat-

ional Bank, one of six to which the city defaulted last Saturday when unable to repay SUSIS.SM due in short-term loans. Earlier, Cleveland bankers had given the Cleveland a two-week reprieve to solve its financial crisis.

The City Council leader, Basil Russo, told reporters the banks would not make any legal moves for two weeks to seize assets to recover their debts.

Despite the last-minute reprieve, unions representing Cleveland’s 1800 police and 1000 firemen gave notice of strike action if the Mayor (Mt Dennis Kucinich) went aheao with his plan to lay off half their members.

“The Criminals are about to take over. Crime will rule this city,” he Patrolmen’s Association leader, William McNea, declared.