He WON. The City Still WON’T PAY

Fire truck turning on a city street
Photo: danielcgold / Shutterstock

A New York City firefighter won his job back in court almost four years ago. On September 11 he was still in a courtroom, trying to collect the money a judge said the city owed him.

Story Snapshot

  • Timothy Rivicci was fired on November 5, 2021, for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine.
  • A judge ordered him reinstated in October 2022, with back pay and legal fees.
  • News reports put that award at roughly $192,000. He is back at work. The money has not come.
  • A Brooklyn appellate panel heard the city’s appeal on September 11, 2026.

What The Court Ordered

Timothy Rivicci worked at Engine 158 on Staten Island until the city fired him for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine. State Supreme Court Judge Ralph J. Porzio ruled in October 2022 that Rivicci should get his job back. The order said he was owed back pay and benefits dating to November 5, 2021, the day he first asked for a religious exemption. News reports at the time valued the back pay and attorney fees at about $192,000.

Rivicci did return to full duty at his firehouse. That part of the order was carried out. The money was not. Four years after the firing and nearly four years after the ruling, he has his job and none of the pay a judge awarded him. His attorney, Christina Martinez, put the sequence plainly: a court annulled his termination, ordered him reinstated, and awarded the back pay he lost.

What The City Argued

The city did not accept the loss quietly. New York City’s Law Department said it strongly disagreed with the ruling. It called the vaccine mandate firmly grounded in law and necessary for public health. It also argued the ruling clashed with other decisions that had upheld the same mandate, which gave the city grounds to keep fighting rather than pay.

City lawyers made a second argument that mattered more in practice. They said that filing a notice of appeal automatically paused the judge’s order. On that reading, nothing had to be paid while the case moved upward. That single procedural point is what turned a decided case into a four-year wait, and it is the mechanism at the center of the September hearing.

What It Cost At Home

The money was not abstract. Rivicci’s wife also worked for the city and also lost her job over the mandate. With both incomes gone at once, the couple could not make their mortgage payments. That is the practical shape of a stayed order. The legal question stays open for years while the household absorbs the loss right away.

On September 11, a panel of four appellate judges in Brooklyn heard the city’s argument for erasing the back pay obligation. A large crowd of supporters showed up. The panel moved his case to the front of its docket. That is a small courtesy, but after four years it is also the first sign of urgency the case has drawn.

Why This Reaches Past One Firehouse

People disagree sharply about vaccine mandates, and this case will be read through that lens. But the narrower fact does not require anyone to change their mind about 2021. A court issued a specific order with a specific number attached. Years later the number has not been paid, and the reason given is a procedural stay rather than a ruling that the order was wrong.

That is the part that travels across politics. Most people accept that they can lose a fight with a government agency. What unsettles them is winning one and finding the win does not arrive. When an agency can pause a judgment by filing paper, the gap between losing and winning gets thin, and the person on the other side pays for the delay out of their own pocket.

Sources:

lifesitenews.com, law.justia.com, nypost.com

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