It's a "dream team" of celebrities New Yorkers love to hate.
According to a poll of Manhattan residents conducted for a civil lawsuit, No. 1 on the least-liked list was "Queen of Mean" Leona Helmsley. Seventy-one percent held an unfavorable opinion of the hotel mogul, who has been convicted on tax evasion and who once boasted that, "Only little people pay taxes."
No. 2 on the list was Lizzie Grubman, the public relations maven convicted of using her luxury SUV to mow down 16 people outside a trendy night club on Long Island. Sixty-two percent held an unfavorable opinion of of Grubman.In the No. 3 position is the Rev. Al Sharpton, a Democratic presidential candidate. He's best known in New York for his role in the Tawana Brawley case, in which a 15-year-old black girl alleged she had been abducted and raped by six white law enforcement officers. Her claims were ultimately found to be a hoax. Sharpton had an unfavorable rating of 60 percent.No. 4 is lifestyle goddess Martha Stewart, who has lately been fighting insider trading allegations. Stewart's unfavorable rating was 49 percent.In the No. 5 slot is casino operator/real estate mogul Donald Trump. The New York Post quoted a Trump assistant as saying: "I don't believe it. It can't be true." Trump was gonged by 47 percent.The poll was commissioned by lawyers for Helmsley, who is a defendant in a civil suit. The operators of the Empire State Building, including Helmsley, are being sued because of a fatal shooting rampage on the skyscraper's 86th-floor observation deck in 1997.
The lawyers commissioned the poll by Trial Solutions Inc., a trial strategy consulting firm, in a bid to prove that Helmsley couldn't get a fair trial in Manhattan.