DISTRICT ATTORNEY TENDY CONDEMNS DIPIPPO SETTLEMENT

CARMEL, NEW YORK – August 14, 2020 Putnam County District Attorney Robert V. Tendy released the
following statement today regarding the County’s decision to settle the lawsuit filed by Anthony DiPippo:
The Putnam County Legislature,
1 with the approval of the Putnam County Executive and Putnam County
Attorney, has agreed to settle a civil rights lawsuit filed by Anthony DiPippo by giving him 12 million
dollars. I condemn this decision in the strongest terms possible.

It is my strong opinion, and prior courts have agreed, that Mr. DiPippo’s civil rights were never violated.
Had the Legislature, County Executive, and County Attorney bothered to take the time to look at this
lawsuit carefully by conferring with my office, they would have realized that this lawsuit had no factual or
legal basis and would ultimately fail. In all the years that the plaintiff’s criminal case was being tried and
retried there had never been a single finding by any court of a civil rights abuse or any police wrongdoing.
The allegations in this lawsuit could have been disproven. However, the County never completed, and
perhaps never even began, discovery in order to investigate Mr. DiPippo’s baseless claims. They never
held formal depositions of the plaintiff or any of his witnesses. They never conducted any follow-up
discovery because they never truly began the process of defending this absurd lawsuit. In my opinion,
based on the public comments made by the legislators as they cast their votes, the County was concerned
with one thing only: money.

It is a matter of public record that Mr. DiPippo was twice convicted by a jury of raping and murdering a
twelve-year-old girl. He was found not guilty after a third trial. This does not translate into giving him 12
million dollars.

The negligence on the part of everyone responsible for this decision is astonishing—and the decision is
reprehensible. While the plaintiff’s lawyers held perhaps one hundred hours of depositions of

approximately a dozen witnesses and demanded and received thousands of pages of discovery—
something the defendant County was supposed to do first but did not—the County took no depositions
and received minimal to no discovery. Accordingly, it was impossible for the County to adequately
examine the plaintiff’s claims. It is incomprehensible that the county would agree to give the plaintiff 12
million dollars simply because he asked for it; but, realistically, that is what occurred. Had they consulted
with my office, they would have discovered the baselessness of the plaintiff’s claims.
I am astonished and sickened by this decision. It is incomprehensible and indefensible.

1 Only one legislator, Nancy Montgomery, voted against this settlement.