Attorneys and activists representing Legionnaires’ disease victims from Harlem who suffered and died during an outbreak last year said they want to be sure their clients get the same attention as this year’s victims from Manhattan’s Upper East Side.
While the deadly disease doesn’t discriminate, they said they want to be sure city officials and building owners don’t either.
“Accountability is essential, not only to provide justice for those who were harmed, but to ensure that a tragedy like this doesn’t happen in Harlem or anywhere else in the future,” civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump said Thursday as he announced lawsuits against the city and contractors responsible for maintaining the cooling towers linked to last year’s outbreak that killed seven people and sickened nearly 120.
“This had real consequences on real people who live in Harlem. They deserve to be treated with the same dignity and respect as anybody else. That’s what this lawsuit is about.”
The lawsuits seek damages for wrongful death, economic loss and emotional distress, Crump said.
Rev. Al Sharpton speaks at a press conference announcing law suits related to the Harlem Legionnaires’ Disease outbreak. (Barry Williams / New York Daily News)
Crump, with several plaintiffs at a news conference at the Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network headquarters in Harlem, said he empathizes with the Upper East Side victims, but wants to be sure that one zip code isn’t favored above another.
City health officials identified an outbreak in Central Harlem in July 2025. According to court papers, one or more cooling towers at two buildings later tested positive for live Legionella bacteria, with more than 100 people diagnosed in connection with the outbreak.
One of the sources of the bacteria was an under-construction public health laboratory overseen by Skanska USA, which is listed as a defendant in Crump’s lawsuits. A spokesman for the company declined to comment on the lawsuit.
Harlem resident June Cooley said doctors were reluctant to even test her mother for the disease when she was rushed to Harlem Hospital with difficulty breathing last year.
”I don’t think that would have happened in another neighborhood,” Cooley said.
Meanwhile, New York City has been dealing with this year’s deadly Legionnaires’ disease outbreak on Manhattan’s Upper East Side that has killed seven people.
Legionnaires disease victim Nunzio Quinta shows a rash during a press conference at the National Action Network headquarters. (Barry Williams / New York Daily News)
City officials said this week that the latest outbreak is under control.
“Protecting public health and safety is at the center of the City’s response,” a spokesman for the city’s law department said in a statement. “We will carefully review these cases.”