By: Benyamin Davidsons
New York City paid a colossal $794.4 million in legal judgments and claims during the fiscal year which ended on June 30th. The management report, released two weeks ago by Mayor Eric Adams’ office, indicated that this represents a 38 percent jump over the $575.9 million paid throughout the previous 12-month period. The city’s law department said it didn’t know if this was a new record, but the NY Post reported that the fiscal year’s payouts were the highest of all years, based on records it reviewed since at least 1998.
As per the Post, the jump in payments can be chalked up to a few hefty liability case settlements made in fiscal 2022. Additionally, the city’s district attorneys made a concentrated effort last year to review more wrongful conviction cases and exonerate the innocent, which led to more civil lawsuits being made against the city and more settlement payments by the city. “We live in the litigation capital of the world, and the breadth and scope of city operations is enormous,” said Law Department spokesman Nicholas Paolucci. “The city is always working to drive these costs down, and settlements usually cost taxpayers significantly less than taking cases to trial.”
As reported by the NY Post, the most notable payout, made from taxpayer dollars, was $36 million paid to Alonzo Yanes, a former student at Beacon High School in Manhattan who was disfigured in 2014, while conducting a 10th grade chemistry experiment. Yanes had originally been awarded $60 million during a 2019 trial, but the payout was negotiated down to $36 million following an appeals court hearing.
There were another $34 million in payouts made to several Staten Island residents who say they got cancer from living near city landfills. Also, $13 million was paid to Samuel Brownridge, a Queens man who served 25 years in prison for a 1994 shooting, but was later found innocent. Another $5.35 million was paid to Bladimil Arroyo, who also spent 18 years in prison, for a 2001 Brooklyn homicide, which he was later found innocent of.
As per the Post, the $794.4 million in judgments does not even include another $355.7 million, which the city reluctantly paid to pacify a federal judge’s 2012 ruling which found that a state-mandated certification exam was biased against blacks and Latinos. A class action lawsuit, famously known as Gulino Vs. Board of Education, challenging the racially discriminatory impact of several standardized tests New York City used in a re-certification process for teachers. The case is slated to be the largest payout in the city’s history — ultimately projected to cost taxpayers over $1.3 billion.
The case says a state teacher certification exam was biased, leaving many black and Hispanic candidates to fail. So far, a court-appointed special master has awarded $600 million in back pay and pension credits plus $43 million in lawyers’ fees- payable to 2,244 plaintiffs who were demoted, fired or never hired as NYC teachers.
Despite the massive jump in payouts, the city was slapped with less litigations. In fiscal 2022, the city was hit with 8,284 federal and state lawsuits, down from 9,103 suits filed in the previous 12 months, as per the Post.
