N.Y. Daily News Pension Is Probed : Scandal: Its handling by Robert Maxwell is the target of the investigation.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office said Thursday that it has launched an investigation to determine whether New York Daily News pension or employee savings plan assets were misappropriated under the paper’s late publisher, Robert Maxwell.

The “active, ongoing investigation” by the Rackets Bureau began Monday, spokesman Gerald McKelvey said, and was apparently triggered by a complaint from a Daily News employee.

Maxwell, his family and his companies are the subjects of investigations in London concerning the disappearance of up to $1.4 billion from two publicly traded companies he controlled before falling to his death last month in the waters off the Canary Islands. Most of the money was taken from employee retirement funds.

District Atty. Robert M. Morganthau’s probe does not concern the nearly $200 million in pension assets accrued under the Daily News’ previous owner, Tribune Co., sources said. Rather, the investigation centers on whether Maxwell violated the law by failing to set up a new pension plan for 300 management employees with some of the $67 million he received for taking the News and its accumulated liabilities off Tribune Co.’s hands in March.

In addition, investigators are looking into whether the Daily News’ failure, before it sought bankruptcy court protection last week, to hand over $312,000 in employee contributions to the trustee for the paper’s 401(k) savings plan constituted fraud.

In other Maxwell-related developments Thursday:

* The European, an ambitious continental newspaper created by Maxwell 18 months ago, said it would cease publication next week and that its staff of 140 would be laid off. The English-language newspaper was designed by Maxwell to serve a pan-European readership. But it failed to attract advertisers and was losing money at an estimated rate of $360,000 a week. The announcement may have been an attempt to force a commitment from one of two potential buyers.

* The Spanish judge conducting an inquest into Maxwell’s death said she had ruled out murder, but closed the case without determining Maxwell’s cause of death. Maxwell’s creditors could collect on a $35-million insurance policy if his death is determined to have been accidental.

* McGraw-Hill Inc. said its joint-venture textbook publishing company with Macmillan Inc. is “completely insulated” from any claims that might be brought against the Maxwell group, which includes Macmillan.

* Kevin Maxwell told ABC-TV’s “Primetime Live” that the Daily News needs more than $150 million in new capital to ensure its long-term survival.

* The News launched an attempt to renegotiate leases and cut other expenses in a race to eliminate weekly losses of $400,000 to $500,000. If left unchecked, the losses will eat up all the paper’s remaining cash by early next year.

* Britain’s Serious Fraud Office widened a probe into Robert Maxwell’s affairs to examine charges of a possible scheme to illegally prop up the price of Maxwell Communications Corp., the publicly traded firm that owns Macmillan. The squad said it might launch an investigation of the New York brokerage Goldman Sachs’ role in Maxwell stock dealings.

Victor F. Zonana reported from New York and Rone Tempest reported from London.