With the largest police force in the country, New York City pays more than any other metropolis to settle lawsuits filed against the city’s finest.

 

A review by the Associated Press of litigation targeting the New York Police Department found the city has paid nearly $1 billion over the past decade to resolve claims. The $964 million in settlements covered everything from brutality cases to patrol-car wrecks to stationhouse accidents, and included cases involving the same police officers again and again. One Brooklyn precinct sergeant was sued at least seven times for excessive force and brutality, and a narcotics detective was sued six times.

 

Although it averaged $100 million a year in settlements, New York was not tops in terms of payouts per officer. That distinction belongs to Chicago’s police force, second largest in the nation. It paid an average of $2,930 per officer over the past six years; New York’s average from 1999-2008 was roughly $2,700.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Nearly $1B in NYC Police Payouts (by Colleen Long and Jennifer Peltz, Associated Press)