US: The ramifications of the Kerik affair spread yesterday, opening up a Pandora's Box of unsavoury information damaging to the hitherto untouchable heroes of 9/11, New York's former mayor, Mr Rudolph Giuliani, and former police commissioner Mr Bernard Kerik.
The withdrawal of Mr Kerik's nomination as head of the Homeland Security Department has become a major debacle for President Bush, raising questions about his decision to nominate a law-enforcement official who had a reputation in New York for unethical activity.
Mr Kerik told Mr Bush on Friday that he was withdrawing from the job, which would have put him in charge of enforcing immigration laws, because he had employed an illegal immigrant as a nanny.
White House officials have put the blame squarely on Mr Kerik for not disclosing this earlier despite repeated queries from officials vetting his nomination about a possible "nannygate".
They have also made no secret of their displeasure with Mr Giuliani for promoting Mr Kerik, though Mr Bush "graciously" accepted the apology of the former mayor at a previously-arranged White House dinner on Sunday evening.
Republicans such as Mr Pat Buchanan said yesterday that Mr Giuliani's presidential ambitions have received a severe setback over his close relationship with Mr Kerik, about whom several new allegations have emerged in the New York media.
Both the Daily News and the New York Times accused Mr Kerik of a web of relationships with officials of a New Jersey construction company long suspected by New York authorities of connections to organised crime.
When serving as New York City correction commissioner in the late 1990s, Mr Kerik allegedly spoke to the city's Trade Waste Commission on behalf of a close friend who was helping the company, Interstate Industrial Corporation.
The company hired the friend, Mr Lawrence Ray, the best man at Mr Kerik's wedding, to help with its licensing problems. Mr Ray told the New York Times that he gave Mr Kerik more than $7,000 in cash and other gifts during the time Mr Kerik was head of prisons and then head of the police in New York. Interstate also hired Mr Kerik's brother, Mr Donald Kerik.
Mr Kerik and one of the owners of Interstate, Mr Frank DiTommaso, acknowledged that they were friends, but deny any effort to influence the licensing process. Mr Giuliani said he believed the former police commissioner informed the White House of the issue last week after New York newspapers began asking questions.
In January 2004 ,New York regulators recommended denying Interstate the licence because of the suspected Mafia links.
They charged that the company paid more than $1 million in 1996 to buy a waste site from a company controlled by a captain in the Gambino crime family, and then employed organised crime figures there and did business with trucking companies owned by crime figures.
In recent testimony, an infor-mant, Mr Anthony Rotondo, charged that Interstate paid cash to the DeCavalcante crime family of New Jersey to discourage union labour. Mr Ray has since pleaded guilty to committing stock fraud in an unrelated case.
The Daily News also claimed that Mr Kerik had conducted two extramarital affairs simultaneously, using a secret Battery Park City apartment for liaisons with a city correction officer, Ms Jeanette Pinero, and with top publishing executive Ms Judith Regan. It said that the two other women in Mr Kerik's life discovered each other's existence after Ms Pinero discovered a love note left by Ms Regan in the apartment.
Allegedly Mr Kerik (49), married with two children, carried on the romance with Ms Regan for months through the writing and promotion of his autobiography, The Lost Son, which her company published.
His affair with Ms Pinero resulted in two lawsuits against New York City, both brought by prison officials who claimed Mr Kerik blocked their promotion after they reprimanded her.
One resulted in a $250,000 settlement last year and the other was at hearing last week.
Mr Bush is now searching for a new nominee to head the Homeland Security Department, which employs 180,000 people and incorporates 22 government agencies. .