More than a year after two-year-old Greta Greene was hit and killed by a piece of the facade at The Esplanade on West End Avenue and 74th Street, the owner and management company have been charged for failing to maintain the building. A release from the Buildings Department says:
“The Criminal Court Informations charge Esplanade Venture Partnership and Alexander Scharf, its managing agent and principal majority shareholder, with violating provisions of the New York City Administrative Code that require all parts of a building, including the exterior walls and appurtenances, to be maintained in a safe condition. It is alleged that even though the defendants had been notified of deteriorating façade conditions that posed a danger to the public, they failed to make necessary repairs in subsequent years. The charges carry a maximum penalty of $25,000 or up to a year in jail, or both.”
The two-year-old and her grandmother were hit by pieces of the facade while they were sitting outside the building on a bench. An engineer was convicted of signing off on a phony inspection report for the building and received probation.
When contacted, the person who answered the phone at the Esplanade said he “cannot discuss this with you right now.”
The building is now covered in netting as facade work continues.
Good. I’ve never been able to get this story out of my head.
read this elsewhere:
“When you own a building, you have a responsibility to maintain it — you don’t just get to cash the rent checks and call it a day,” DOB Commissioner Rick Chandler said.
You earn a DUH for redundancy
well, you had hostility cornered.
A two-year-old is gone and now the landlord can receive a year in prison and a $25k fine. All because he wanted to save money (I assume) by delaying necessary maintenance. That math doesn’t remotely equate. There’s no justice in this. I feel so sad for this little girl and her family.
Rest assured that if the owner is convicted, or pleads to a related offense, the real money will flow in the civil suit brought by the girl’s parents.
I only hope they didn’t settle with the owner prematurely; I guarantee you that the owner’s insurance company showed up the next day with a handful of cash to release them of all liability. Assuming the parents declined an early offer, there should be wheelbarrows of money at issue after the criminal disposition.
Think it’s fair to differ in that you can be sure the family sued, has or will litigate and or settle(d) for significant amount of $. This is almost as bad as an alligator eating your kid in front of you. And we know Disney paid out big for that o-o-c settlement. So surely there’s that to compensate the family.
“An engineer was convicted of signing off on a phony inspection report for the building and received probation.”
So, a little girl is killed, and the engineer
gets a probation for signing a phoney report?
Where is the justice in this case?
I don’t mean to say that getting a substantial payment for the death of the girl is going to solve the pain caused the family, but I hope the owner gets hit with 1000 times the $25K the court will level against him.
Seems to me the engineer would bear far more guilt than the owner. Assuming, of course, that the owner hired him in good faith to evaluate the building’s facade and acted alone in submitting a false report.
There were multiple crumbling windowsills. There is no way management didn’t know the facade was dangerous. Why would the engineer file a false report if not asked to do so but the owner? Think this through.
Laziness?
And, maybe the building looked bad, but if the engineer says it’s ok, are you going to question him? Are you an expert on building facades?
I agree – I do not understand why that engineer was not prosecuted. I can’t believe that signing off without ever actually inspecting was not a criminal act. Both of these people bear responsibility for this.
Maqsood Faruqi the engineer was arrested, charged and plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge (filing a false instrument), he was sentenced to two years probation.
Such a low level conviction carries one year or less in jail. Had he gone to Riker’s likely he would have been out in six or seven months (or less).
Finding it rather ironic that the City is getting all indignant when it was their DOB that dropped the ball. As noted above a private consultant *did* notify the City/DOB about the unsafe conditions, but no one could be bothered to read his email.
What is needed is a cleaning out of various city agencies; far too many career civil servants at managerial and or administrative level that are too comfortable behind their desks.
I really hope the family clobbers The Esplanade & Scharf in the civil suit.
Whenever these sort of things happen the City is always sued along side owners, and for good reason.
IIRC under current laws even if the city is only found to be a percentage at fault for the incident, it can be made to pay the full amount of judgment if the other party cannot or will not.
The parents and the grandmother will never recover. Never. No money can compensate them for their loss. I hope they can find some peace.
That is not much of a fine when you consider the consequences! Will the convicted engineer also get off lightly?