Mayor home after disappearance

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – The perplexing mystery of this seaside casino resort city’s missing mayor appears near a conclusion.

Mayor Bob Levy, who vanished two weeks ago, had been in a New Jersey psychiatric hospital, said his attorney, who wouldn’t explain Levy’s ailment. The former lifeguard whose disappearance threw city government into turmoil is now back home, resting, the lawyer said.

The revelation added fresh froth to a story already churning out unflattering international headlines. It cast no light on whether Levy would resign amid a federal probe into his military benefits and left political leaders continuing their scramble to contain what New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine has called “chaotic and dysfunctional” behavior and settle the question of who’s in charge.

The mayor checked into the Carrier Clinic in Belle Meade – a private hospital in Somerset County, N.J., specializing in psychiatric and addictive illnesses – on Sept. 26 and remained there until Thursday, when he returned home to Venice Park, lawyer Edwin Jacobs said. Jacobs said Levy would convalesce at home for four to six weeks.

He wouldn’t say whether Levy would resign his $100,000-a-year job.

But a resignation may not be necessary. After a 40-minute, closed-door conference Tuesday, Superior Court Judge Valerie Armstrong scheduled a hearing for Friday, when she could decide whether to declare the mayor’s office vacated.

In the two weeks since Levy left City Hall in his city-owned SUV and dropped from the public eye, his disappearance has become news from here to London.

The disappearance came amid reports that Levy is the subject of a federal investigation into whether he embellished his Vietnam War military service record to collect a larger pension than he is due.