Mayor Adams seeking dismissal of sex assault lawsuit, citing accuser’s bankruptcy case

Mayor Adams’ attorneys are requesting that a civilian lawsuit accusing him of intersexual battle beryllium dismissed connected the ground that the pistillate who filed it is successful bankruptcy proceedings.

In a Manhattan Supreme Court filing precocious Friday, Adams’ Law Department attorneys wrote they had not realized his accuser, ex-Transit Police worker Lorna Beach-Mathura, was successful Chapter 7 bankruptcy proceedings until the Daily News archetypal reported it earlier this month.

Citing lawsuit instrumentality holding that individuals successful bankruptcy cases suffer “standing” to personally bring civilian suits, the attorneys wrote that the presiding justice should promptly docket a proceeding connected dismissing Beach-Mathura’s suit outright. They argued immoderate civilian suit by an idiosyncratic successful bankruptcy indispensable beryllium brought by the person’s “estate,” a impermanent ownership operation meant to springiness much accidental to creditors who are owed money.

“Plaintiff mislaid her capableness to writer erstwhile she filed her Bankruptcy Petition astir 5 months,” Adams’ attorneys wrote.

Beach-Mathura’s lawyer didn’t instantly instrumentality a petition for remark connected the dismissal request.

Beach-Mathura declared idiosyncratic bankruptcy successful her location authorities of Florida this past Sept. 11, revealing she owes astir $333,000 to assorted creditors, including banks and hospitals.

A fewer weeks earlier she declared bankruptcy, Beach-Mathura besides filed a slip-and-fall suit charging the metropolis should wage her astatine slightest $75,000 aft she fell successful Queens owed what she described arsenic a “defective and uneven” kink successful a sidewalk, arsenic besides first reported by The News.

Beach-Mathura, who’s seeking immoderate $5 cardinal successful damages implicit the alleged assault, says successful her suit that Adams tried to unit her to execute oral enactment connected him successful a parked car successful 1993 portion they some worked for the city’s since-defunct Transit Police agency. When she refused his overture, she alleges helium masturbated and ejaculated connected her leg.

Adams has vehemently denied the accusations and says helium can’t callback ever gathering Beach-Mathura, who archetypal filed her suit successful March 2024.

Mayor Eric Adams speaks during property availability successful the Blue Room successful City Hall Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025 successful Manhattan, New York. (Barry Williams/ New York Daily News)

According to tribunal papers filed earlier this week, Beach-Mathura, Adams and the NYPD, which is besides named arsenic a suspect successful her action, person agreed to widen find connected the intersexual battle assertion done June 20. If that timeline stays successful place, it would mean the lawsuit volition proceed past  the mayor’s scheduled Manhattan Federal Court proceedings successful April connected corruption charges, to which helium has pleaded not guilty.

Beach-Mathura precocious sat for a deposition successful the intersexual battle case, though nary details from that interrogation person been publically disclosed to date.

Before Friday’s dismissal filing, Megan Goddard, Beach-Mathura’s attorney, told The News that find has been bogged down by a deficiency of accumulation of records from Adams’ administration.

“We’re inactive waiting connected basal find production, similar employment records,” Goddard said, referring to documents she’s seeking from the metropolis detailing the Transit Police enactment past of her lawsuit and Adams.

A Law Department spokesperson said the employment records are proving hard to find arsenic they are from implicit 30 years agone and produced by Transit Police, an bureau that nary longer exists arsenic it was merged with the NYPD successful the mid-1990s.