You were hurt on the job, and somebody told you that police officers and firefighters do not get workers’ compensation in this city. That part is true. The problem is that most people stop the conversation there, as if it were the end of the subject.
It is not. In some ways a uniformed member hurt by an outside party is in a stronger position than a civilian with an ordinary comp claim, and New York has two statutes written specifically to put you there.
First, the part everyone gets right
The City says it plainly: City employees are covered for workers’ compensation with the exception of uniformed police officers, firefighters and uniformed sanitation workers. Those three titles sit outside the comp system and inside the City’s own line-of-duty and disability machinery instead.
That is also why the ordinary advice does not fit you. Nearly everything written about being hurt at work in New York assumes a comp claim exists. Most City employees do have one. You do not.
What you have instead: the right to sue whoever caused it
General Obligations Law § 11-106 gives police officers and firefighters a right of action for line-of-duty injury or death proximately caused by “the neglect, willful omission, or intentional, willful or culpable conduct of any person or entity.”
The limit is who it does not reach: anyone “other than that police officer’s or firefighter’s employer or co-employee.” You cannot sue the City as your employer and you cannot sue your partner. Everybody else who caused your injury is fair game.
That statute exists because for most of the last century a version of the old firefighter’s rule barred exactly these suits. The Legislature took the bar away. A lot of people still believe it is there.
And a second claim that most injured people never have
This is the one worth reading twice.
General Municipal Law § 205-e for police officers and § 205-a for firefighters create a separate statutory cause of action where an injury results from someone’s “neglect, omission, willful or culpable negligence” in failing to comply with a statute, ordinance, rule, order or requirement.
Think about what that does. An ordinary negligence case asks whether someone behaved unreasonably, which is a jury question and an argument. A § 205-e or § 205-a claim can be anchored to a written rule that was broken — a building code provision, a fire safety requirement, a vehicle and traffic law, an administrative regulation — and a causal connection between that violation and your injury.
Cases that would be difficult as pure negligence are sometimes straightforward when the defendant was violating a code. It is a tool civilians simply do not have, and it is routinely left on the table.
Sanitation is in a different position
Uniformed sanitation workers are outside workers’ compensation the same way, but § 11-106, § 205-e and § 205-a are written for police officers and firefighters. A uniformed DSNY member hurt by an outside party brings an ordinary negligence case rather than one of those statutory claims.
Ordinary does not mean weak. It means the case is built the usual way, and that the two statutory shortcuts above are not part of it.
The lien that is not there
In an ordinary case where a worker has comp and also sues a third party, the compensation carrier holds a lien against the recovery and takes back what it paid. It is one of the most frustrating conversations in this practice — explaining to someone that a meaningful share of the settlement is going back to an insurance company.
There is no compensation carrier in your case, so that lien is not part of the picture.
What is worth establishing early, rather than assuming in either direction, is whether the City asserts any right of recoupment of its own for line-of-duty pay or medical costs. Ask the question at the start of the case, when the answer can still shape decisions, instead of discovering it at the end.
Ninety days, if a public entity is the defendant
This is the deadline that quietly ends these cases.
Where the party who caused your injury is a public corporation — another municipality, a transit or housing authority, a public agency that is not your employer — General Municipal Law § 50-e requires a notice of claim served “within ninety days after the claim arises.” Not the ordinary personal injury limitations period. Ninety days.
A court may extend that time in its discretion, weighing things like whether the public corporation already had actual knowledge of the essential facts and whether the delay caused it real prejudice. But an extension is an application you have to win, not a right, and it cannot stretch past the deadline for starting the case itself.
Ninety days goes quickly when you are having surgery. If there is any chance a public entity is responsible for what happened to you, that clock is the reason not to wait.
Where these cases come from
- A civilian driver. Struck at a scene, hit responding, rear-ended in an RMP. Motor vehicle cases are the most common by a distance.
- A property owner. A collapsed stair, a defective roof, an unlit shaft, a locked or obstructed exit — and often a code provision that says it should have been otherwise.
- A construction site. Labor Law §§ 240 and 241 may apply to a response that takes you onto one.
- A dog, or an animal owner who did not restrain it.
- Defective equipment made or maintained by somebody who is not the City.
One thing to keep in mind on motor vehicle cases: the serious injury threshold still applies to you the way it applies to everyone else in New York.
Frequently asked questions
I am getting my full pay. Is there anything to sue for?
Salary continuation is not the measure of what a serious injury costs you. Pain and suffering, permanent loss of function, the effect on the rest of your working life and on what you can do outside the job are all part of a third-party case and none of them are covered by a paycheck arriving on time.
Does filing a lawsuit affect my pension application?
They are separate proceedings with separate standards, and a disability pension application is its own specialty. What they share is a record: the line-of-duty paperwork, the medical documentation and your own account of how the injury happened will be read in both. Consistency across them matters more than most people realize.
Can I sue the City at all?
Not as your employer — § 11-106 says so directly, and the same goes for a co-employee. Whether the City can be a defendant in some other capacity, such as an owner of property unrelated to your employment, is a fact-specific question rather than a flat no.
It happened two years ago. Am I too late?
It depends entirely on who the defendant is. Against a private party the ordinary personal injury period applies. Against a public corporation the ninety-day notice and a much shorter deadline to sue are in play. That difference is the reason to ask rather than assume, and to ask quickly.
What about September 11 conditions?
That is a different track with its own programs and registration deadlines, and it matters for a great many members of both departments. World Trade Center claims are addressed separately.
What should I bring?
The line-of-duty injury report, the aided card or accident report if one exists, the names of anyone who witnessed it, the names of everyone who has treated you, and any photographs taken at the scene. If a code violation or a broken piece of equipment was involved, say so early — that detail can change what the case is.
If you were hurt on duty by someone else
Call 718.701.2776 or 800.310.5520. The consultation costs nothing, and if a public entity may be responsible, the ninety-day clock is already running.
This page describes New York law in general terms. It is not legal advice about your case, and reading it does not make us your attorneys.
