The Phoenix reviewed more than $23 million in payments made from the city’s Execution of Courts budget, from July 2002 through December 2005.
Negligence and accidents: $3.8 million
• 1111 payments on claims from motor-vehicle accidents, totaling $3.2 million
• 610 payments on claims related to public structures, totaling $301,000
•98 payments on claims related to public walkways, totaling $222,000
•352 payments on claims for towing damage, totaling $150,000
•72 payments on claims related to maintenance and other causes of personal injury or property damage, totaling $514,000
Administrative faults: $5.1 million
•More than $2 million for interest on tax abatements, which arise when the city overcharges people or businesses for property or excise taxes
•$1.6 million for Suffolk Construction for claims related to its work on the Boston Latin School
•$1.5 million to settle breach of contract claims with city vendors
Employee actions: $1.3 million
•14 payments for excessive use of force by police, totaling $725,000
•14 payments for false arrest, totaling $325,000
•Eight payments, totaling $131,000, for claims related to child supervision (not including claims against the Boston Public Schools, which has its own execution of courts budget of $161,000)
•Six payments for medical malpractice at the former Boston City Hospital, totaling $117,750 (limited to $20,000 per case under state law)
Major settlements and judgments: $13.1 million
•$5 million for the city’s share of a settlement with women who were unconstitutionally strip-searched at Suffolk County correctional facilities
•$5,100,000 for the death of Victoria Snelgrove, killed by police misuse of pepper-pellet guns on Lansdowne Street after the Red Sox won the pennant in 2004
•At least $600,000 for Richard Dahill, a Boston Police Academy graduate denied a job because of his hearing impairment
•$247,127 for white firefighters passed over in favor of minority candidates
•$240,000 for inspectional-services employee Julie Fothergill, for job retaliation she suffered after blowing the whistle on bid-rigging by the department’s head, Kevin Joyce
•$175,000 for a female police officer who was improperly let go because of her physical disability
•$140,000 for back wages on an equal-pay lawsuit
•$126,000 to settle a meter maid’s sexual-harassment suit
