New York Personal Injury News & NYC Legal Current Events

Brooklyn Construction Site Owner Acquitted After Fatal Accident

The owner of a Brooklyn construction site has been found not guilty of manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, and reckless endangerment in a trial concerning the death of a New York City construction site worker.

NY businessman William Lattarulo was building a new coin laundry at a site in Brooklyn using illegal immigrants and shoddily drawn plans that he had completed himself instead of hiring an architect. Going against expert advice, Lattarulo asked his workers to dig a trench at the building site in an unsafe manner, causing the wall of the structure next door to fall on construction worker Lauro Ortega. Ortega was crushed by dirt and construction debris.

Lattarulo’s lawyer argued that the construction site owner was being held up as an example to other New York City contractors and property owners after a slew of deadly construction accidents occurred in 2008. The New York defense attorney argued that Lattarulo was cutting corners and cutting costs to a dangerous degree – but agreed that a manslaughter charge would be hard to prove in any construction worker death case.

But although Lattarulo has been acquitted of the above charges, he now must return to court for two civil lawsuits – a New York wrongful death lawsuit that has been filed by Ortega’s family and a property damage lawsuit filed by the family whose house was ultimately destroyed because of Lattarulo’s poor construction site decisions.

It is unclear whether the coin laundry operation’s building will continue in the future.

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