A Queens man who was pushed through a plate-glass window by an NYPD sergeant chasing him for stiffing a cabbie out of a $10 fare has pocketed a $120,000 settlement from the city despite admitting he was drunk as a skunk and “deserved what I got.”
Brett Fasulo, 31, scored the payday after a federal judge ruled that his excessive force and assault claims against Sgt. Louis Fishman could proceed to a civil trial.
The settlement papers were filed Wednesday in Brooklyn Federal Court.
The sergeant secretly recorded a conversation with Fasulo at the 111th Precinct after his wounds were stitched up at the hospital, and he was all apologies.
“I’m sorry,” Fasulo said, according to a transcript of the audiotape. “I swear I was blacking out. I didn’t have any idea that I was being chased by a cop.
“I deserve what I got. I was a total a——e,” he said.
A spokesman for the city Law Department said the settlement was in the best interest of the city. A source familiar with the suit said after Judge Carol Amon declined to toss it, Fasulo’s claims could not be considered frivolous.
Fasulo, a deliveryman for United Parcel Service, testified in depositions that on the night of May 6, 2012, he had downed five Red Bull and vodka cocktails and three shots of Patron tequila at the Safari club on Bell Blvd. in Bayside.
He left the club in the early morning hours and hailed a livery minivan to take him home to Fresh Meadows.
But five minutes into the ride, Fasulo informed the driver that he had no cash and claimed the driver became irate when he asked him to make a stop at an ATM, according to court papers.
The cabbie instead made a stop at the police stationhouse and Fasulo bolted from the car.
Fishman, who was the desk sergeant, left his post and went outside with Officer Willio Loris where they got in the minivan with the cabbie and drove around looking for the deadbeat.
When they spotted Fasulo on Northern Blvd. near 217th St., Fishman jumped out and briefly chased him.
Fishman testified in a deposition that when Fasulo stopped, squared around and threw a punch at him, he responded with a two-handed push of “moderate” force that sent Fasulo backward through the storefront window.
In the secret recording, Fishman reminded him that he was yelling “police, stop” during the brief foot chase. “You know it’s one thing being drunk running from a cab. . . . But, dude, you turned around like Mike Tyson and tried to knock me out,” Fishman said.
Fasulo denied throwing a punch at the sergeant and also claimed he suffered a black eye and a busted lip, but he couldn’t recall how that happened.
He received 60 to 70 stitches and later underwent surgery to repair a severed tendon in his thumb. He was out of work while recovering from his injuries and lost $32,000 in pay, court papers say.
Reached outside his home Wednesday, Fasulo said he just wanted to put the incident behind him.
“I really don’t want to discuss it, to be honest with you. It’s something that I just want to move on from. I’m over it. What happened happened and I’m just moving forward,” he said.
Fasulo’s lawyers did not respond to requests for comment.
