CRIME

Ex-Little League coach charged with kidnapping

By Albert Amateau

Police last week arrested and charged Lawrence Omansky, 54, a lawyer and long-time Tribeca resident known as a devoted Downtown Little League dad, in connection with a bizarre kidnapping in which an estranged real estate partner said he was bound with duct tape and thrust into a crawl-space beneath the floor of Omansky’s apartment and trapped for 28 hours.

Police say the incident began on the morning of Mon. April 14 when the victim, Lawrence Schlosser, 63, a real estate investor who lives on Washington Sq. S., came to Omansky’s home in a converted fire house at 160 Chambers St. to talk about a building they co-owned which Omansky managed.

Schlosser told police that after he told Omansky that he no longer wanted him to manage their building, an argument ensued and Omansky punched him, threw him onto a bed and held a knife to his throat and threatened to kill him.

Schlosser said that Omansky then bound and gagged him, said there was someone else in the room who would kill him if he tried to flee, and then went out for two hours. Omansky is then said to have returned with papers which he forced Schlosser to sign, turning over several pieces of real estate.

Schlosser says he was again bound and gagged with duct tape and put through a trap door in the bathroom floor into the narrow crawl space. He struggled for hours, found a piece of pipe with which he banged on the trapdoor and was finally able to spring it open to emerge at 5:30 p.m. Tues. April 15, hungry, thirsty and filthy but otherwise unharmed, police said.

Omansky surrendered to police on Wednesday, denied the charges of first degree kidnapping and coercion and was released on Thursday on $100,000 bail after arraignment. His lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, said “This case will ultimately be viewed as a business dispute that should be resolved in a civil forum as opposed to the criminal courts.” The defendant was due to appear in Criminal Court Part F on Tues. April 22.

Omansky, divorced several years ago, is a well-known figure in Tribeca, having coached Little League sports when his three daughters were younger. “I can’t imagine Larry doing something like that,” said Judy Duffy, a former Little League vice president. “He was a devoted father.”

His former wife and daughters are also Tribeca residents in a building at 49 Warren St. where Omansky has an interest, according to a Daily News report. Omansky’s mother, Lillian Lubling, told a News reporter that Omansky had come to her home in Lynbrook, L.I. on Monday afternoon.

He is also well known in Criminal Court at 100 Centre St. where he serves as a court-appointed defense lawyer. Indeed, on Wednesday, the arraigning judge who knows Omansky had to ask for advice about whether to recuse himself, but was told to carry on because everyone knows the defendant.

David Kapner, a Legal Aid supervisor who has known Omansky for years, told the Daily New that he was “shocked like everyone else,” and that Omansky served his clients well

Schlosser and Omansky have known each other and have done business together for about 30 years. Omansky, who has a music business sideline as well as real estate interests, is described as an imposing high-energy person with a bald head and a Fu Manchu mustache.

The former firehouse, which Omansky converted several years ago, is furnished with Asian objects gathered on trips to Thailand, according to friends. The conversion added another story to the building and created the crawl space where Schlosser said he was trapped last week.

Albert@DowntownExpress.com