Key Points
The jury found the NITA police officers unlawfully arrested former Metro-North condttctor Thomas Moran and violated his free speech rights. Moran suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.
A former Metro-North conductor won a nearly $r million verdict Monday against three MTA police officers who forced him to the ground and handcuffed him during a violent confrontation in Grand Central Terminal in zot7.
Thomas Moran has been unable to return to worl< since August 2ot7 when he was charged with assaulting an officer and resisting arrest after requesting the officers’help with a wheelchair passenger who refused to leave the train. Moran sued in zor9.
A jury in U.S. District Court in Manhattan awarded Morzn, 54, nearly $Boo,ooo in compensation for unlawful arrest and violations of his free speech and another $r8o,ooo for punitive damages for the actions of three MTA police officers, Nicholas Strype, Douglas Cohen and Jason Nandoo. The jury rejected unlawful arrest claims for a fourth officer.
Criminal charges against Moran were dismissed by a judge in February zor8
Moran declined to comment. His lawyer, George Cahill, said he was too exhausted from the weeklong trial.
“Tom Moran and his family are very happy that he was vindicated for this unnecessary and unlawful misconduct by the MTA Police,” Cahill said.
A spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority said its attorneys are “assessing post-verdict options. ”
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Moran’s arrest, captured by MTA surveillance cameras, came during a period of heightened tension between Metro-North conductors and MTA police.
After the incident, Moran’s union called for the officers’ arrest and accused them of brutality The officers countered, saying Moran yelled and cursed at them when they tried to intervene in a passenger dispute.
In the video, officers take the burly Moran to the ground and handcuffhim while another stands nearby holding a German Shepherd on a leash. Passengers stroll by, one appearing to capture the arrest on his phone.
Moran said he went to the officers for help after a disorderly passenger refused to exit an
early-morning northbound New Haven Line train when he told him it would not stop at re5th Street in Harlem.
Northbound trains pick up passengers at rz5th Street but don’t allow them to exit there.
Moran said he was trying to direct the passenger to a Hudson Line train that stopped at 125th Street.
Moran was jailed for r4 hours after the altercation and has not returned to work. Cahill, his lawyer, said he suffers from post-traumatic stress.
“Basically I got attacked for doing my job,” Moran said in February zot8, after Manhattan prosecutors announced they could not prove the criminal charges of assault and resisting arrest.
Cahill said it was notable that the jury awarded punitive damages for each of the three officers.
“The jury had to find that the conduct was so extreme and outrageous that actual compensatory damages are inadequate to punish the wrongful conduct,” Cahill said.
Edward Valente, a conductor and the general chairman of Moran’s union, the Association of Commuter Rail Employees, said Moran has been unable to return to his old life since the arrest.
“I am very happy that he was finally exonerated of all charges and awarded damages but you can never put a number on the trauma and the emotional suffering Tom has had to endure,” Valente said. “I pray that Tom and his famrly can one day put this ugly incident behind them.
What is the officers’ version of their interaction with Moran?
In pre-trial depositions, the officers said Moran cursed them, calling them o’useless” after he approached them at a gate at the top of the platform asking for help.
When they asked for his identification Moran refused and walked back along the platform where his r:o7 a.m. train was waiting to depart, they say.
In his deposition, Strype, one of the officers, said before the arrest he and another officer confronted the passenger while he was sleeping in his wheelchair in the terminal.
The passenger said he was headed to 125th Street and showed him a ticket. Strype said he couldn’t understand why Moran would not allow the man on the train.
“I eventually told him he had a valid ticket and he just didn’t want to hear what any of us had to say because he was too busy being angry and unruly that he just continued to walk away after every time we said something,” Strype said during a November zorg deposition.
Moran’s lawsuit admits he told an MTApolice officer “You guys are useless” after being told they couldn’t help.
As he walked back to the train, one of the officers yelled “Why don’t you jus-t d9 your job”‘ “l am doing my job,” Moran responded. “Why don’t you do your job?”
He was taken to the ground moments later.
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