Monday, February 8, 2010

Real estate businesses helped move Sept. 11 trials

New York City's real estate businesses were instrumental in persuading political leaders to move Sept. 11-related trials somewhere else.

Stephen Spinella remembers the moment. The president of the New York Real Estate Board attended a meeting at which the police commissioner outlined the frozen zones and rooftop sniper plans to secure a Khalid Sheik Mohammed trial in lower Manhattan.

He says the frozen zones for the trial would have shut many businesses off from their customers.

Spinella says he raised the economic issue with the White House deputy chief of staff in November.

The decision to have the trials elsewhere is said to have been made, but has not been announced.

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