Al Sharpton settles lawsuit filed against city of New York

Jet, Jan 5, 2004

New York City has agreed to pay $200,000 in damages to Democratic presidential candidate the Rev. Al Sharpton after he was stabbed nearly 13 years ago at a protest where he said police failed to protect him.

Sharpton was hospitalized for five days in January 1991 after Michael Riccardi stabbed him with a 5-inch knife in a Brooklyn schoolyard just blocks from where Yusuf Hawkins, a Black teenager, was cornered and fatally shot in August 1989 by a group of White youths wielding baseball bats.

Sharpton, who has a 1-inch scar on his chest from the assault, says he still fears large crowds.

The settlement came as jury selection was to begin in his decade-old civil case against the New York Police Department.

Sharpton claimed police were "careless, negligent and reckless" during the incident. His attacker, was convicted of first-degree assault and sentenced to the maximum of 5 to 15 years in prison.

The settlement included an agreement to pay Sharpton's $7,447.76 hospital bill, said his lawyer, Sanford Rubenstein.