concerning allegations that many plaintiffs suing over 9/11 are malingerers. Nothing new in that.
But what is the basis of their cause of action? From what I can make out they are suing NYC. For what? Failing to put anti-aircraft nets around the city? Permitting buildings to be made out of stuff that turned to dust when blown up? Failing to erect signs warning of the danger of terrorist incidents?
I note that about half are city workers and I can perhaps understand that there would be a breach of duty of care in actively sending them into the 9/11 situation, but what about the rest?
The article doesn’t touch on this at all, but it’s possible some of them think the government either knew about 9/11 beforehand and did nothing to stop it or planned 9/11 from the beginning. The fact this makes absolutely no sense on multiple levels only makes them that much more determined. So I suppose their underlying cause of action would be “I am batshit insane”.
No, there will be something more than that. This is serious litigation by proper law firms. They must have something more than batshit insane conspiracy theories. Besides which, they are not suing the US govt, they are suing the city of NY from what I can gather.
> Lawyers for the workers say the city should stop fighting the claims and start
> paying them. The federal government created a $1 billion insurance fund to
> handle such claims. The fund is administered by the city.
In other words, the federal government has already agreed to pay people injuried from the 9/11 attacks from a fund totalling $1 billion. The question now is which of these people will receive money and how much money they will receive. Whether the money should be given to them at all is no longer in contention. (Note: Whether you like this or not is irrelevant to this legal case. The issue has already been agreed upon by all relevant parties.) The federal government has decided the city of New York will administer the fund. The city’s claim is that some of these people haven’t yet given them sufficient medical information to allow them to decide the relative amounts of injury that they have suffered. The city further claims that some of these people have suffered no significant injuries.
1/ The plaintiffs put up a case and the Feds decide they were going to lose and so conceded liability. In which case does anyone know what that case was?
2/ The Feds decided (as an act of policy) that they were going to set up a fund for victims, motivated by charity rather than an adverse view on their own liability.
But the lawsuits in this case are brought by ground zero workers who are claiming illnesses based on environmental exposure–not those injured or killed in the attack:
Note that New York City (and every other city) spends millions of dollars every year settling “slip and fall” claims and the like which it really has no responsibility for.
As claims against cities go, the workers have a pretty good one.
Many people who make tort claims for injury are not injured. The courts are clogged with asbestos suits wherein most of the plaintiffs are not ill or can’t reasonably demonstrate their illness is a direct result of exposure to asbsestos.