In short, yes you can “sue City Hall” and we do not shy away from pursuing meritorious causes of action against municipal defendants on behalf of our clients. Municipal liability encompasses a wide range of personal injury cases against villages, towns, and cities throughout New York State. Examples include automobile accidents with city employees such as police officers, sanitation workers, and transportation workers; or the accident could involve trip and falls over defective sidewalks or injury due to a failure to remove snow and ice from city owned property. There could be a malpractice action against a city owned hospital for failure to diagnose cancer, operating on an incorrect area of the body, or misdiagnosis of a medical condition. Police officers must act in accordance with the law, and there are cases of excessive force, unlawful arrest, false imprisonment, assault and battery and deprivation of civil liberties under the New York State and United States Constitution. It is critical that you retain attorneys who have the requisite knowledge, skill, background and experience to be successful in a municipal liability case. There are many differences between a case against a town or village on the one hand, and a private defendant, which are traps for the unwary and those who do not regularly represent clients in municipal liability cases. For example, in all cases against municipalities, there is a notice of claim requirement, (which is not required in cases against private individuals) which mandates that a notice of claim be properly filed with the town, village, city or other municipal corporation within 90 days of the incident. Not only is there a notice of claim requirement in this very short period of time, but if the notice is not proper in form, is not filed with the correct entities, or does not name the specific departments or individuals that are potentially liable, your case could be jeopardized or dismissed. The amount of time within which you have to sue a municipality after an accident is significantly shorter than the amount of time to sue a private person, and even within the field of municipal liability cases, there are variations and reduced statute of limitations which significantly restrict the time in which you can bring a claim. Do not delay and contact our office for a free and confidential consultation. |