Some of the characters who’ve sued the New York City government in cases previously unremarked on this site:

* The alleged wife-beater who, on being arrested by police, stumbled drunkenly down the stairs and broke his ankle, though he got nothing from a Manhattan jury;

* The legally blind Bronx man who “drove his car into a concrete barrier” and sued arguing that better lighting might have prevented the accident;

* The man who sued for wrongful arrest after being charged with buying a stolen SUV at a city airport parking lot for $75; he claimed in his unsuccessful suit (PDF) that he thought that was a legitimate sale price;

* The “two inmates who shot themselves with a smuggled handgun in their Rikers Island jail cells — and sued. (A guard was responsible, they argued before a judge kicked out their case.) ”

Meanwhile, a 1998 jury award of $76.4 million to remains on appeal; that’s the one where “a reputed Bronx gang member [was] left paralyzed by a gunfight with an off-duty police officer. The city argued that the officer only returned fire after the plaintiff shot at him with a Tech-9 submachine gun.” (Larry McShane, “Who Do You Call When Someone Says ‘Sue the City’? Meet Michael Cardozo”, AP/New York Lawyer, Dec. 20). Two other cases won by the city this summer, not mentioned in the article: this excessive-force case (PDF) involving a Bronx man who tried to escape two officers in a high-speed chase (more high-speed chase cases); and this slip-fall accident (also PDF) in which the locus and circumstances of the injury seemed mysteriously to have revised themselves in a manner unfavorable to the city. (More on suits against New York City.)

Filed under: crime and punishment