Imelda Sheds Cape in Effort to Shed Pounds in Cartoonist Eyes

Imelda Marcos, apparently concerned about how she’s being portrayed in tabloid cartoons, today took off her cape at her racketeering trial “so I won’t look so fat.”

The former Philippine first lady, on trial with Saudi arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, took a bit of umbrage at the beefy representation of her physique in a New York Post cartoon.

The cartoon depicted Marcos walking by a shoeshine boy and an associate telling the shoe shiner, “This may be your lucky day,” a reference to Marcos’s once-huge footwear collection.

As she sat down for the third day of jury selection in her trial, a smiling Marcos, eyeing the cartoon, said, “I’m taking off my cape so I won’t look so fat.”

Marcos, 60, is accused of plotting a $345-million racketeering scheme with her husband, Ferdinand, to siphon money from her native land’s treasury. Prosecutors say Marcos, with Khashoggi’s help, transferred more than $160 million from the Philippines and invested it in Manhattan real estate.

Twenty-four people have been selected for a pool of potential jurors to hear the case against Marcos and Khashoggi. A pool of about 60 people must be picked, from which a final panel of 12 jurors and six alternates will be selected to hear the case.