Reporter gets mafia warning

A man has been charged with threatening a woman reporter working on a story of an alleged mafia link to the actor Steven Seagal, by leaving a dead fish with a rose in its mouth and a one word note, "Stop", in her car in Los Angeles last summer.

The plot seems to belong more on screen than in reality, but Alexander Proctor, aged 59, faces three years in jail if convicted. He is pleading not guilty.

He allegedly told an FBI informant that he broke the windscreen of Anita Busch's car and left the fish on the instructions of a private investigator, Anthony Pellicano, who works for celebrities.

Use of a fish is notorious as a mafia message indicating that its recipient will "sleep with the fishes" unless he or she heeds the warning.

Mr Proctor claimed that he was working for Pellicano on Seagal's behalf because the reporter was investigating the actor's associates. He told the informer he was working for "guys back East". Seagal and Mr Pellicano have both denied through their lawyers any involvement or knowledge of any plot.

Seagal, a star of action films, was a witness in a separate case in New York that ended on Monday with seven men being convicted of racketeering. He said a business partner introduced him to mobsters in New York who demanded payoffs, and the partner told Seagal afterwards that he would have been killed if he had said the wrong thing.

According to the prosecution in the Los Angeles case, Mr Proctor was in debt to Mr Pellicano and agreed to warn Busch off the story for $10,000. He said Mr Pellicano was so pleased with the job that he agreed to wipe out the entire debt. At first, the prosecution said, Mr Proctor was going to put a bomb under Busch's car, but decided he might be seen. When charged yesterday, Mr Proctor was already in custody on a cocaine charge.

While one alleged mob case proceeded, a different row over fictional mobsters continued. James Gandolfini, star of The Sopranos, and HBO, the TV show's producers, are in talks after the actor threatened to quit unless his contract was renegotiated, reportedly doubling it to $800,000 an episode.