Lesson to self: Don’t get killed by a New York police car, unless you want your family to get hit with a bill.
Tamon Robinson, 27, died in April after he was hit by a squad car that was chasing him after he stole paver stones at the Brooklyn housing project where he lived. True, he probably shouldn’t have been stealing, but if he’s dead, he’s paid for it, right?
The NYPD doesn’t think so. His mother, Laverne Dobbinson, is being hounded by a collection agency the city hired, which is demanding she pay the $710 to fix the police car that ran down her son, the New York Daily News reports..
“We’re still grieving, and this is like a slap in the face. They want my son to pay for damage to the vehicle that killed him. It’s crazy.”
Robinson slipped into a coma after Officer Volkan Uretener hit him and he never regained consciousness. He died six days later from blunt impact head injuries and the city medical examiner ruled his death an accident.
Meanwhile, Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes said his department is still investigating, and the NYPD Internal Affairs Bureau is hearing allegations that Uretener deliberately ran down Robinson.
So in NY a police car rans over a guy, kills him and now NYPD asks mother to pay for the car repair.
— Stefan Esser (@i0n1c) October 6, 2012
Samuel Rubenstein, Dobbinson’s attorney, plans to sue the city and he’s warned the NYPD not to have the car repaired, as it will be evidence in the criminal investigation.
Rubenstein says the $710 bill is a “disgrace.”
“In my 40 years of practicing law in this city I have never seen anything as heartless as this.”
The collection agency says it can’t discuss Robinson’s debt with anyone but his family, and the police haven’t commented.
But Dobbinson said as her son was brain dead in Brookside Medical Center, he was still kept shackled and under police guard, and she was only allowed to visit him for 20 minutes.
And as if all that isn’t bad enough, the day the family buried Robinson, cops broke down their apartment’s front door, later acknowledging they were at the wrong apartment.
The police department paid for the damaged apartment, so the family didn’t have to sic collection agencies on them.
Robinson was stealing the pavers to sell to scrap dealers, his mother said. He was working in a Connecticut donut shop when he died. Ironic, isn’t it?