Worby, Vecchio, Edelman LLP

More than 600 people have filed a class-action lawsuit contending they suffered health problems from the cleanup of the World Trade Center, officials said yesterday. The billion-dollar federal suit, which seeks money for medical testing and screening, cites the effects of WTC toxic diseases, according to a news release. A press conference about the case is scheduled for tomorrow at a hotel near Ground Zero. This complaint names a number of defendants who owned, managed, controlled and leased the various buildings within the WTC complex, the release said. The specific defendants were unclear, but they seemed likely to include twin towers leaseholder Larry Silverstein, the Port Authority, which owns the site, and the city. The lead lawyer in the case is David Worby, who could not be reached for comment yesterday. His firm, Worby Vecchio Edelman, LLP, represents two NYPD detectives who sued the city in June.That suit, by detective John Walcott, who has terminal cancer,

WHITE PLAINS Ten years ago today, a propane tanker heading east on Interstate 287 barreled toward the median, its driver asleep at the wheel at 12:30 a.m., having slept only 5½ hours in the previous two days. The cab of the 80,000-pound truck shredded the guardrails as it rolled over, while its tank sheared off one of four columns supporting the Grant Avenue overpass. The impact cracked open the tanker, releasing gas. Sparks ignited the gas, sending a fireball into the sky. The explosion propelled the tank 300 feet north, where it landed on a house, engulfing it in flames. The accident killed the 23-year-old driver and injured 23 others. It also took out half the overpass, destroyed five homes and damaged 17 others. The economic toll, including settlements, was in excess of $14 million. Nearly nine years after the national Transportation Safety Board recommended ways I-287 should be redesigned to make it safer for heavy trucks, none of the improvements has been implemented

Two NYPD detectives are claiming in a new lawsuit that the city failed to protect them from toxic fumes at Ground Zero and from 9/11 debris at Fresh Kills landfill. Detective John Walcott, 39, who has terminal cancer, and his partner in the narcotics division, Richard Volpe, 36, who has developed kidney disease, want substantial compensation from the city for their grave illnesses, their lawyer said yesterday. The suit was filed in Manhattan Federal Court on Thursday. These are otherwise young, healthy, athletic men who were working full-time plus overtime on the force, and working on their own time, said their lawyer, Richard Vecchio, of the firm Worby Vecchio Edelman,LLP. It s coming out that the different chemicals and toxins emergency workers were exposed to are making a lot of people sick, Vecchio said. The city s law department refused comment yesterday. Police unions have identified more than a dozen officers with cancer they claim developed after 9/11. D

St. Vincents faces 2nd suit over sex attacks on patients WHITE PLAINS The mother of a developmentally disabled teen yesterday sued a psychiatric hospital in Harrison where her daughter was sexually assaulted last year, marking the second lawsuit filed since November over a sex attack there. The lawsuit seeks unspecified money damages from St. Vincents Hospital of Westchester, based on allegations it failed to protect the girl, then 15, from fellow patients who abused her. A developmentally disabled 18-year-old woman faces felony sex charges in the incident, which authorities said took place Aug. 15. The victim s mother was not available for comment, but the victim s father said he hoped the lawsuit would force the closure of St. Vincents, a 133-bed hospital owned by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn and the Sisters of Charity of New York. We re doing this to prevent something like this from ever happening again, the father said. We need to make the public aware o

The former girlfriend of a Tuckahoe baseball star who tried to strangle her before throwing himself in front of a train last May has sued the Tuckahoe school district, her lawyer said. The former girlfriend, Bridgette Maldonado, now 18 and a high school senior, filed the suit Tuesday in Westchester County Superior Court, contending that the school system did nothing about the violent, criminal behavior of her former boyfriend, Brian Morris, 17. Her lawyer, David Worby, said the principal of Tuckahoe High School at the time, Paul Siragusa, had assured Ms. Maldonado that she and her brother were safe, even after Mr. Morris allegedly threatened to kill them. With the history this kid had, to guarantee their safety just defies imagination, Mr. Worby said. As a matter of law, when the principal heard of the death threat, the police should ve been involved. Patrick Fitzgerald, a lawyer for the district, said that the attack against Ms. Maldonado took place away from school groun

Girl alleges district ignored boy s strife before his suicide WHITE PLAINS The former girlfriend of a Tuckahoe High School baseball star who says he attacked her before throwing himself to his death in front of a train has filed a $50 million lawsuit against the Tuckahoe school district, claiming school officials ignored the 17-year-old athlete s history of violence and threats. White Plains lawyer David Worby filed the suit Monday in state Supreme Court in White Plains on behalf of Bridgette Maldonado , now an 18-year-old Tuckahoe High School senior, and her mother, Yvette Maldonado. Bridgette Maldonado says that on the night of May 8, she was attacked in her apartment by Brian Morris and choked until she was unconscious. Morris then went to the nearby Tuckahoe railroad station, where witnesses said he jumped in front of a speeding train. Every single person in that school system was aware of Brian Morris five-year history of threats, violence and intimidation toward stud

A Bronx landlord was found partially liable yesterday for the 1993 slayings known as the St. Valentine s Day massacre and was ordered to pay the victims families a chunk of a $16.4 million judgment. A Bronx Supreme Court jury agreed that the five murders might not have happened if Dearborne Management and Prospect Union Associates had provided better security at its Mott Haven apartment building. The landlords were ordered to fork over $6.23 million 38% of the megabucks judgment while the five men serving life sentences for the killings must pay the rest. This was justice, said Howard Frederick, lawyer representing one of the victims families. The jury did a good analysis of a complicated case. On Valentine s Day eve 1993, killers looking to settle a drug related dispute with tenant Edwin Santiago entered the Prospect Ave. building through a broken door. No guard was on duty to stop them from killing Santiago Christopher Hernandez, Annette Medina and Julia and

Victim s lawyer blames Cottage School for attack WHITE PLAINS Edith Toro s cheeks were coated with red burn marks, and tears poured from her eyes yesterday as she described the night she said eight girls tortured her at Pleasantville Cottage School and threatened, You re going to die tonight. The former counselor, giving her most detailed account of the Feb. 7 attack, said the girls tore off her clothes, poured rubbing alcohol on her face and set it afire, then refused her cries for water. She even lied that she was pregnant in hopes that the girls would back off, but they just started laughing, she said. They didn t want to kill me right away, she said. They kept saying how much I was going to suffer. She described the ordeal during a news conference in the office of David Worby, her attorney, who said he was preparing a lawsuit seeking tens of millions of dollars. Last week, he served notices of claim, the prerequisite to a lawsuit, against three governmental ag

Victim s lawyer lays groundwork for filing civil suit MOUNT PLEASANT The eight girl wanted in connection with a brutal attack on a counselor at the Pleasantville Cottage School has been arrested. Erica Mateo, 14, was picked up shortly after 9 p.m. Sunday in the Bronx, where she was spotted at a pay phone near East 180th Street and Webster Avenue, Mount Pleasant Police Chief Louis Alagno said yesterday. We ve had two officers checking various locations in New York City a few times a week, and we finally found her, Alagno said. He said Mateo was arrested without incident. I think she was resigned to the fact that she had finally been apprehended, he said. She said she had considered turning herself in but just couldn t bring herself to do it. News of the arrest came on the same day lawyers for the 32-year-old victim announced that they have obtained a court order compelling the Jewish Child Care Association, which owns and operates the Cottage School, to provide info

Construction crew, companies blamed in wrongful-death case The widow of a Yorktown man who was killed last year when a forklift pierced his car window is seeking $20 million in damages from several defendants. Maureen Korn, whose husband, Samuel was killed Nov. 9, is suing the forklift operator, a dump truck driver who was blocking part of the roadway, both of their employers, and the contractor for the construction site. The lawsuit, filed yesterday in state Supreme Court in White Plains, seeks $10 million in damages for pain and suffering and another $10 million from the defendants for causing the wrongful death, said David Worby of Worby Vecchio Edelman, the White Plains law firm representing Korn. Because of the outrageous conduct of these defendants and the grossly negligent way in which they conducted their business at the construction site on that day, the Korn family has been deprived of a loving husband and father, and the community has been deprived of a selfless in