Officer Demoted After Writing Traffic Tickets Gets $175,000 Settlement
Officer Demoted After Writing Traffic Tickets Gets $175,000 Settlement
Matthew Bianchi said he was transferred after he angered a high-ranking official of the New York Police Department by ticketing a friend.
New York City on Tuesday reached a $175,000 settlement with a Staten Island police officer who said he had been a victim of retaliation for giving traffic tickets to people with connections to the upper echelons of the Police Department.
The officer, Mathew Bianchi, filed a lawsuit against the city last May. The suit said that he had been transferred out of his precinct’s traffic unit after Jeffrey Maddrey, then the chief of patrol and now the department’s highest-ranking uniformed officer, asked that he be punished. Officer Bianchi had issued a ticket to a woman with whom Chief Maddrey was said to be friends, according to the suit.
“This settlement is a vindication for our client, allowing him to close this chapter and continue his service with the N.Y.P.D.,” John Scola, Officer Bianchi’s lawyer, said on Tuesday. “We hope that Officer Bianchi’s courage and this decisive outcome will inspire other officers to come forward as whistle-blowers.”
Ah, sounds like that traffic stop started with, "Do you know who I am?"
The police literally have 'courtesy cards' they hand out to friends and family to avoid getting them ticketed - that's a practice that absolutely needs to stop.
Growing up I had a relative with one of these cards, signed on the back by the leader of the SWAT in the next town over. My relative was high on opiods while driving with me in the car when we got pulled over because he was nodding off and kept swerving and rolling stop signs and doing other dumb shit. He showed the cop the card and that was that, the cop was suddenly so nice and just let him drive off obviously drugged out of his mind with a child in the car.
I think it should continue but every person who presents said card should automatically get the harshest legal punishment possible for whatever their infraction was.
Would have been a warning? Guess what, that card now entitles you to a $500 ticket.
Someone needs to print out a bunch of copies and leave them by the mailbox for people to take.
I got one of these from an immediate family member and had way too much shame to ever use it and never got a new one. It definitely gives "don’t you know who I am" energy, without actually being anyone, and idk how anyone sleeps at night acting that way
No, but maybe I'll find out when you hand me your driver's license, registration, and proof of insurance like I asked...
Dispatch, suspect is asking if we know who they are. Contact the local Alzheimer’s care facilities, see if they have any runaways.
*Don't you know who I am?!
So they fired, chief Maddrey, right?? Since he's the one who actually abused his position. Otherwise, what the hell is the point of this payout? It'll just happen again.
They're not trying to stop it from happening again, they're trying to get us all to shut up about it until the next person tries to assassinate Trump so the media cycle can sweep this under the rug. That's what the big settelment is for.
Officer Bianchi, who joined the force in 2015, said in his lawsuit and in subsequent interviews that the standard practice in his precinct, the 123rd on Staten Island, was to avoid ticketing drivers who had cards issued by police unions — known as courtesy cards — which officers distribute to their friends and family. His troubles in the department, he said, stemmed from his willingness to issue tickets to cardholders.
Naked corruption.
The settlement did not involve any admission of wrongdoing from the city, which in court papers denied most of Officer Bianchi’s allegations, including those about Chief Maddrey’s role in his transfer.
No lessons learned. At taxpayers' expense.
His troubles in the department, he said, stemmed from his willingness to issue tickets to cardholders.
And this is why ACAB. If there is a cop applying the law equally to everyone they get punished and pushed out.
Sure, he won his lawsuit, but I'm betting he's still not going to be a cop anymore. And the people involved aren't going to be punished or penalized, they got exactly what they wanted.
Let me ask the obvious question: how easy were the cards to duplicate?
Because all it takes is just send them to everyone that lives in the precinct.
Original article is paywalled so I looked up another, as from the comments here, it seems some more details are needed. I'll include some snips of a WaPo article here.
One driver giggled when New York police officer Mathew Bianchi pulled her over for talking on her cellphone, because it was the second time in as many days that he had done so, the officer said.
Another was going at least twice the 30-mph speed limit while driving on the wrong side of the street and blowing through red lights, he added.
A third who had been doing 50 mph in a 30-mph zone reacted to Bianchi approaching his Mercedes SUV by fanning out about two dozen “courtesy cards” and telling him to pick one, Bianchi said Wednesday.
In fact, all three of them had the cards issued by the New York Police Department’s biggest union to officers who then give them to family, friends and anyone else they want to be able to get out of low-level encounters with law enforcement, Bianchi told The Washington Post.
“There’s no fear of any kind of enforcement if they have the card,” he added.
Although he let all three of those drivers go, Bianchi eventually got fed up with letting reckless drivers off the hook, some of them repeatedly, and started writing tickets even if they had the cards, he said. That allegedly led to escalating retaliation that in May 2023 resulted in Bianchi suing the city and a police captain after he was pulled off the traffic unit and put on the night shift.
Bianchi patrolled on Staten Island, where he estimated as many as half the drivers he pulled over had one of the cards, he told The Post. Officers can buy 30 of them a year for $1 each, he said. They’re given not only to friends and family, but also in exchange for perks like meal discounts, he said, adding that he believes that is violating the public’s trust that police treat everyone equally.
On Nov. 28, 2018, Bianchi gave a driver a ticket even though she presented a card, the suit states. Several members of the Police Benevolent Association allegedly approached him, one telling him that he had to obey the courtesy-card customs or the union wouldn’t protect him.
Bianchi started objecting to the practice, first to his direct supervisor and then his commanding officer, who told him they couldn’t do much, he said. Then he filed a series of complaints — to the union, NYPD internal affairs and the New York City Department of Investigation — without getting any results, according to the suit.
All the while, Bianchi kept writing courtesy-card-carrying drivers tickets when he thought it was appropriate and kept getting scolded for it, the suit states.
Bianchi said he plans to stay at the NYPD for the foreseeable future, although he plans to use his upcoming windfall to reduce his reliance on the paycheck he gets from the city. He said he hopes that his lawsuit — and his payout — encourage other would-be whistleblowers to speak up about corruption, even if there is a cost.
I'm not sure how much more some of you want out of this guy. He got tired of a crooked system, and at cost to himself, he stood up for the right thing. He's taken more direct action for change than most people ever will. I can't speak of all his actions, but if he went through this much for something like traffic tickets, I don't think he was doing a bunch of bigger corrupt stuff on the side. It would seem we would want more police to follow his example, but instead people here are lumping him in with the rest.
I'm not sure how much more some of you want out of this guy
Don't worry, I'm sure the ACAB brigade will soon be here to scream about how this guy is still horrible because he didn't do everything that they personally demand be done...
As a member of the ACAB brigade, this guy is trying to do what is right. The result is exactly why we say ACAB.
Consider this is about traffic tickets and imagine what this guy’s outcome would be if he found something worse. Like something analogous to the LA sheriff’s department gangs, or the Chicago PD’s secret torture sites. We wouldn’t be reading about a lawsuit that he won.
I've got a healthy skepticism of authority as much as the next Lemming, which is why I went and saw what info was out there about this. It was easy to find, and it seems to show this guy was retaliated against for doing what was morally right, there doesn't seem to be much denying that. Are we here to role play as wanting social justice, or are we here to support the people doing it? This guy did the literal thing all the top posts here every day say needs to be done: he used his power for good to hold accountable those who were not.
While he may not be Serpico, he's someone we should all be commending in this particular case. We have facts that on multiple occasions he did good for the city at risk to his personal life and career. If someone wants to lump him in with the ones that are corrupt and murderous or look the other way at things like this, they're the asshole. If we don't support this guy, why would we execpt anyone else to follow his lead?
So where are the suits and convictions for all the people trying to fuck this guy over. Where are the firings of the upper echelons. Where is any fucking oversight.
Maybe if he writes a song about it they will sue for feeling sad.
🎶Lemon Pound Cake🎶
His career is going to be hell. Cops hate a boy scout.
There are no good apples because good apples routinely get punished, or worse. Its reall easy for group of in cops to explain away how the out cop got shot and died.
Hell the cop they claim got shot by cop city protestors turnd out to have been shot in the back of the head when only other police were behind him and nothing came of that except an excuse to beat up protesters. Cops cause more crime than they solve.
The people who said "it's just a few bad apples" are shocked when they did not remove the bad apples and now the entire bag is rotten.
I am sure you can back that wild claim with actual stats? That cops cause more crime (I assume you mean committing?) then they solve (I assume you mean investigating?).
Several members of the Police Benevolent Association allegedly approached him, one telling him that he had to obey the courtesy-card customs or the union wouldn’t protect him.
Looks like they were correct about that. The police union protects almost anything, except giving those with union 'courtesy cards' a traffic ticket apparently. That is just too far.
He better watch his back. Wouldn't be the least bit surprised if he was suddenly and unexpectedly taken out by a "random" perp...
If Cops got MORE Taxpayer Dollars they wouldn't Need to Punish Officers who Ticket People!
He's still a cop though, right? So he's learned nothing.
The cop is in the right, this time. What was he supposed to learn?
He was supposed to learn ACAB.
he had been transferred out of his precinct’s traffic unit after Jeffrey Maddrey, then the chief of patrol and now the department’s highest-ranking uniformed officer, asked that he be punished.
He's learned that the cop who got wronged can pick up $175k in taxpayer money while the cop who engaged in the corruption gets to keep climbing the seniority ladder to do this shit again.
Everybody wins!
I love that everyone is acting like this is the and of the story.
My dude still works at NYPD. This dude's family's life will be a living hell until he moves out of the area.
And Maddry is still in charge.