Southern District Judge Robert Sweet has approved a $75 million class-action settlement that accused New York City police officers of writing at least 900,000 summonses that were later dismissed as insufficient.

“This civil rights class action is the paradigm of change and progress achievable in a society undergirded by the rule of law,” Sweet said Monday in Stinson v. City of New York, 10 Civ. 4228.

The settlement, reached on Jan. 23, is the largest false-arrest class-action lawsuit in city history, according to lawyers for the plaintiffs. Under the settlement, the city must create a class fund of $56.5 million for claimants within 75 days. A separate and additional $18.5 million is to be paid to class counsel by New York City for attorneys fees and expenses.