`Long Island Lolita' Case Titillates N.Y.

NEW YORK - Donald Trump is in bankruptcy court. Leona Helmsley and John Gotti are in jail. If the current batch of politicians are corrupt, they haven't been caught at it yet.

But don't cry for New York's tabloids - "Long Island Lolita" has kept the headlines blaring for the past two weeks.

She is a 17-year-old named Amy Fisher, who is accused of having an affair with a 38-year-old man and shooting his wife in the face.

The victim, Mary Jo Buttafuoco, 37, made what doctors called a miraculous recovery from the May 19 shooting and described her assailant from her hospital bed.

Fisher was arrested and held on $2 million bail. Mrs. Buttafuoco's husband, Joseph, admitted having a yearlong affair with Fisher.

Within days, Fisher was seen in a nationally broadcast videotape purportedly showing her working as a prostitute. Her classmates at Bellmore High School alleged that Fisher used a beeper to keep in touch with Buttafuoco and her other "dates."

The story, headlined "YOUNG GUN" in the New York Post after the shooting, became "CALL GIRL BY NIGHT."

Fisher's attorney alleged that Buttafuoco helped set her up in prostitution and gave her the weapon used to shoot his wife. WNBC-TV reported that bills from Fisher's alleged employer, the Abba Escort service, had been forwarded to the Buttafuoco home.

"LOVER OR PIMP?" screamed the Post. "JOEY GAVE ME THE GUN," proclaimed The Daily News.

Then the TV show "A Current Affair" found Steven Sleeman, a 21-year-old waiter who said Fisher had earlier offered him $600 and sex to kill Mrs. Buttafuoco.

Sleeman, who has since been given limited immunity from prosecution, said he accompanied Fisher, in October, to the Buttafuoco home in the Long Island suburb of Massapequa. While Fisher rang the bell on the pretext of selling candy for charity, he hid with a rifle behind shrubs.

Sleeman said he didn't pull the trigger when Mrs. Buttafuoco stepped onto the porch, and that the gun was empty anyway.

Fisher's lawyer, Eric Naiburg, has described Fisher as an innocent girl whose adult boyfriend held a Svengali-like grip on her. Naiburg called Buttafuoco "the pimp who put her into the prostitution business."

"We've had big cases but nothing like this," said Ed Grilli, spokesman for the Nassau County district attorney's office for the past 13 years. "Not even close. You've got all these different aspects: the sex angle, the violence angle and the way every day seems to bring a new allegation."

And there was a new allegation yesterday. Another man claiming to be a past sexual partner of Fisher's told police she also solicited him to kill Mrs. Buttafuoco. Last August.

He said he refused, but introduced her to Sleeman when she asked if he knew anyone who had a gun.

Grilli said he has fielded more than 250 calls from around the country, including those from movie producers.

At the New York Post, managing editor James Lynch, who writes most of the cover headlines, said: "This one is fun."