FORMER N.Y. GIANT'S DRUG HEARING DELAYED

CLEARWATER - A Retired Sports Star'S Mad Dash For Cover Highlights His
Hearing On Crack Cocaine Charges.

Football Hall of Famer Lawrence Taylor was ready to admit buying crack
cocaine Friday, when a judge halted the hearing and said it would resume
the morning of his Nov. 30 trial.

Taylor contends he was entrapped by St. Pete Beach police, who knew his
crack addiction made him an easy target for an undercover officer posing as
a drug dealer.

At issue Friday was whether Taylor admitted participating in the drug deal,
something he must do in order to argue the entrapment defense, according to
Assistant State Attorney Michael Marr.

Defense attorney Angelo Ferlita argued that Taylor, in a motion filed last
week, admitted paying $50 for a handful of crack rocks. The motion seeks
the dismissal of charges that he purchased and possessed the drug at the
Tradewinds Resort on Oct. 18, 1998.

But the motion states that Taylor merely "obliged'' the undercover police
officer when she threw a mock tantrum after he initially declined to buy
the drug, Marr said. If the entrapment motion should fail, he told
Pasco-Pinellas Circuit Judge Lauren Laughlin, Taylor could then try to
convince a jury that he never intended to buy the drug at all.

Ferlita then offered to have his client take the witness stand to admit
buying the crack. Laughlin subsequently held a private discussion with the
lawyers, which ended when a member of the press objected.

The judge then rescheduled the hearing for the day of trial after Ferlita
announced that he would file a written amendment to his motion.

Following the hearing, bailiffs allowed Taylor to run out a back door of
the courthouse in an attempt to avoid news photographers. The former New
York Giants star, who appeared in court wearing sandals and a sport coat,
roundly cursed everyone in sight as he got into Ferlita's car.

Prosecutors contend Taylor spent part of the day before his arrest cruising
south St. Petersburg seeking to buy crack. Self-described crack addict
Clemente "Dino'' Brown has testified he called police to report Taylor was
looking to buy the drug - because Brown wanted to help the star fight his
addiction.

Brown and a female officer knocked on Taylor's hotel room door at 2 a.m.
after Taylor said on the telephone that he did not want to buy any crack
that morning.

Ferlita contends that Taylor would have played in a charity golf tournament
the next day and then returned to his home in New Jersey had he not been
entrapped by police misconduct. His motion points to Brown's testimony that
he knew Taylor could not resist his addiction once he saw the drug.

Marr contends in a response filed this week that a taped telephone call
shows Taylor did want to buy the drug, after the golf tournament. Police
merely moved up the timetable, Marr wrote. "It was a question of when he
would purchase cocaine, not whether he would."

Should the judge deny Taylor's entrapment argument, Ferlita will then try
to convince a jury his client was the victim of overzealous police, the
defense attorney said.