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Karen Bitchatchi, Respondent v. Board of Trustees of the New York City Police Department Pension Fund, Article II, Appellant

VICTORIA A. GRAFFEO, J.:

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VICTORIA A. GRAFFEO, J.:

Each of these appeals involves a police officer who responded to provide assistance at the World Trade Center following the September 11, 2001 attacks. Two officers seek accidental disability retirement benefits and the surviving spouse of another officer makes a claim for line-of-duty death benefits. Central to all three CPLR article 78 proceedings is the application of the statutory World Trade Center (WTC) presumption (see Administrative Code of City of NY §13-252.1 [1] [a]), under which an officer’s disability or death as a result of a qualifying condition is presumed to be caused by his or her exposure at the WTC site for purposes of benefit upgrades. The common issue presented is whether the pension fund respondents produced competent evidence to rebut the WTC presumption accorded to petitioners’ claims. We hold that respondents did not meet their burden of disproving that the officers’ disabilities or death were causally related to their work at the World Trade Center and related sites. We therefore affirm in Bitchatchi and Macri and reverse in Maldonado.

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