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HIZZONER STILL WANTS TO know how he's doing.
Edward I. Koch, New York City's schmatziest ex-mayor, is presiding over The People's Court, a revival of the Warner Bros. hit of the 1980s. After a long day on the bench in a courtroom set up in the Hotel Pennsylvania, Mr. Koch piles into the elevator with a few members of the audience. His final ruling -- against a Brooklyn woman who had been evicted from her apartment and claimed that the storage company hired by the city marshal ruined her belongings in the process--remains on his mind.
"Whadja think about this last case? Was I right or wrong?" Mr. Koch asks fellow riders as the elevator heads down to the hotel lobby. They have just one floor to nod approval for his ruling in favor of the storage company, which said the plaintiff had failed to collect her things and then doctored sales receipts to back up her $3,000 claim.
Early ratings for The People's Court are also nodding approval for Mr. Koch-whose style on the bench is part no-nonsense, part Jewish mother. If the response continues, Mr. Koch may have found a lucrative new career to add to the nine other professional lives that keep him busy.
If the revival of The People's. Court is a hit, Burbank. Calif.-based Warner Bros. would add another program to its syndicated shows with a New York flair. The Time Warner Entertainment Co. subsidiary already syndicates The Rosie O'Donnell Show, a locally produced...