Some Catskill residents think penalty too stiff

 CATSKILL, N.Y. (AP) -- Mike Tyson can still find a sympathetic ear in this small town, where he trained with mentor Cus D'Amato before he became heavyweight champion of the world.
 On Wednesday, as word got out that the Nevada State Athletic Commission revoked Tyson's license and fined him $3 million for biting heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield's ears in the June 28 title fight in Las Vegas, some Catskill residents came to the defense of the man who used to be a regular fixture in this village.
 "The only reason they did it is because he's Mike Tyson and they hate the fact that he came from the streets," Linc Harris, like Tyson a native of Brooklyn, said of the decision. "I think they should have treated him fairly like they would have treated everybody else."
 Tyson lived around Catskill and trained here in the 1980s with D'Amato, the veteran trainer who later adopted him. After D'Amato's death in 1985, Tyson continued to work with former trainer Kevin Rooney in Catskill until 1988.
 Rooney said the penalty leaves Tyson's career in limbo and called it a "death sentence."
 "That (the penalty) means that some one could always say, 'We deny you again,' " he said. "Now he's at the mercy of the Nevada Commission."
 Rooney doesn't believe that the commission even had the authority to ban Tyson.
 "You can be banned for substance abuse, medical reasons, and that's about it," he said.
 Harris lamented not only the fate of Tyson, but of boxing itself.
 "Boxing is going to be anything unless those two fight," he said of a possible third meeting between Tyson and Holyfield. "I think they should have let bygones be bygones, suspended him ... and gave him a chance.
 "I don't think they should take away a man's life and end his career over it. It was a mistake."