Injury Law Firms SCREWING People Out Of Millions!

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New York City says a Manhattan law firm turned fake slip-and-fall stories into a multimillion-dollar business, and now the city wants its money back.

Quick Take

New York City sued Asher & Associates and its two principals, Ryan and Roberta Asher, accusing them of running a decade-long injury fraud scheme.
The federal complaint says the firm filed at least 15 fraudulent claims demanding $41 million from the city over sidewalk and road accidents.
Prosecutors claim the scheme used false accident stories to blame the city for injuries actually caused by other events.
More than 875 related cases are still pending against the city, Con Edison, and other companies tied to road work across New York.

City Says Law Firm Built A Business On Fake Accidents

New York City Corporation Counsel Steven Banks and Department of Transportation Commissioner Mike Flynn announced the lawsuit against Asher & Associates on October 6. The city claims the firm “orchestrated” a personal injury fraud scheme that stretched back ten years. The 80-page complaint was filed in the Southern District of New York under federal racketeering law, a tool normally reserved for organized crime.

The lawsuit accuses the firm of filing more than a dozen notices of claim and related lawsuits seeking tens of millions of dollars from the city and its Department of Transportation. City officials say the injuries described in these claims did not actually happen the way the firm told it. One New York Post report found 15 specific cases alone that demanded $41 million tied to sidewalk and road accident claims.

Blaming The City For Injuries Caused By Something Else

The complaint alleges a consistent pattern. The city says the firm repeatedly pinned injuries on broken sidewalks or damaged roads, when other records pointed to car accidents, assaults, or other causes entirely. That distinction matters legally. A municipality can be held liable for a defective roadway, but not for injuries that happened somewhere else for different reasons.

Court papers say the firm collected “millions of dollars” in settlements and judgments by running this playbook over and over for a decade. Named defendants include Ryan Asher and Roberta Asher, the firm’s principals, along with nine unnamed “John Does” the city believes also took part. The scale is what pushed this case from an ordinary dispute into racketeering territory.

Why Prosecutors Reached For A Racketeering Charge

Racketeering law exists to go after organized, repeated criminal conduct, not a single bad claim. Legal experts note this approach has become more common against personal injury operations accused of mass-producing fake or exaggerated cases. New York’s no-fault insurance system, which holds insurers liable regardless of who caused a crash, has reportedly created fertile ground for this kind of abuse.

The city’s case fits a larger pattern seen across New York courts in recent years. Insurers and companies like Uber and FedEx have filed similar racketeering suits, alleging law firms worked with shady medical providers to generate inflated injury claims. Reuters reported a wave of these cases targeting lawyers accused of filing claims with exaggerated or fabricated injuries, sometimes backed by cooperating doctors.

Hundreds Of Cases Still Pending Against The City

This single lawsuit is not the end of the story for city taxpayers. More than 875 cases remain pending against the city, Con Edison, and other companies connected to road work across New York. That backlog suggests the alleged scheme, if proven, reached far wider than the 15 cases singled out in the current complaint.

A Wall Street Journal opinion piece framed the lawsuit as a rare moment of a city government fighting back against the plaintiff’s bar rather than settling quietly to avoid a fight. For a city budget already stretched thin, every dollar paid out on a fabricated claim is a dollar missing from schools, police, or road repairs that taxpayers actually paid for. Holding firms accountable here is common sense, not overreach.

An accusation in a federal complaint is not a conviction, and Asher & Associates will have the chance to respond in court. But the facts laid out by the city, backed by an 80-page filing and a decade of alleged pattern conduct, paint a clear picture of what officials believe happened. The case now moves to federal court, where a judge will decide whether the allegations hold up.