New Charge for Bernard Kerik

Disgraced former NYPD Commissioner Bernard Kerik's glib response to White House officials when he interviewed to be director of homeland security may land him in prison.

"Nope, it's all in my book," Kerik said when asked in 2002 if there was "anything embarrassing that he wouldn't want the public to know about." In "The Lost Son," Kerik admitted fathering a daughter while he was a soldier in Korea and said his mother, a prostitute, was murdered.

In a beefed-up indictment issued Tuesday, Manhattan federal prosecutors said Kerik should have owned up to his ties to a mob-linked contractor as well as his failure to pay taxes for a nanny he employed.

Kerik attorney Barry Berke said Kerik's statements were not false since the White House query was vague.

The new indictment, which replaces a previous one, still charges that Kerik got free renovations from a would-be city contractor and filed false income-tax returns.

Kerik was forced to withdraw his nomination for homeland security czar shortly after his name was floated.

Article available here. [Brooks Holland]