Former Elementary School Administrator Earns $230,000 Settlement in Whistleblower Retaliation Suit

Manny Verdi, a former administrator at an elementary school in the Bronx, earned $230,000 in a settlement from the city after alleging he experienced retaliation for acting as a whistleblower.

Verdi was an assistant principal at PS 24 in Riverdale, and filed a lawsuit against the Department of Education in 2016. In the suit, he alleges a superintendent pressured him into leaving his position after he had blown the whistle on Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz of improperly meddling with the admissions process as a means of preventing poor minority children from being able to enroll.

Verdi also has a separate defamation suit currently in progress against Dinowitz, who he says falsely blamed him for the Department of Education’s failure to renew a lease in a building that had been used as an annex for PS 24.

Reporting wrongdoing can be lucrative for whistleblowers

It is natural for whistleblowers to have concerns about coming forward with information about wrongdoing in their companies or within government entities and agencies. However, beyond the federal protections afforded to whistleblowers, there are other reasons why coming forward can be a good idea, including the financial benefits some whistleblowers can obtain as a result of their actions.

In this particular case, Verdi’s award came as a result of the retaliation he experienced. In other types of cases, simply providing investigators with enough information to take enforcement actions against wrongdoers allows those whistleblowers to share in the recovery.

To learn more about the steps you should take to report wrongdoing within your company or agency while also doing everything you can to protect your rights, consult an experienced whistleblower attorney at Kardell Law Group.