Who is Rinaldo Laviolette? Man shot in eye and left disfigured by off-duty NYPD cop sues for $35M
A Long Island man who was shot in the eye by an off-duty NYPD cop for mistakenly going to his house is suing the officer, the city, and the NYPD for $35 million over his “disfiguring” injuries. 27-year-old Rinaldo Laviolette has undergone two surgeries and has a titanium plate in his head now, his attorney said. The March 5 incident in West Babylon has left the man scarred.
Laviolette was reportedly trying to open the door of Detective Douglas DeOtto’s West Babylon home because he thought it was the house of a friend where they had been partying. A friend of the man said that his sister was with Laviolette for a 30th birthday party in a nearby town. A drunk Laviolette left around 3 am after mistakenly grabbing another guest’s wallet and phone instead of his own. Mistaking the cop's house for the friend's house, Laviolette was trying to return the belongings, his friend told New York Post.
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“When he goes to go back, the houses to him kind of begin to look the same,” the friend said. He said that when Laviolette was trying the door at the cop’s house, he found it locked and banged on it. “And it turns out to be an off-duty cop who answers the door and sees this kid disoriented and what he thinks is this person trying to break into this house. This led to what I understand is an argument,” the friend added.
The two had a tussle and Laviolette was shot in the eye. Laviolette’s father said after the incident, "He happened to go to the wrong house. The friend lives three houses down and the house looked similar at night." The incident was being probed by Suffolk police and it was confirmed that had no criminal record. According to court papers, he has lost an eye and suffered brain damage, his skull was “shattered" and his “psyche permanently scarred", New York Post reported.
The lawsuit says that the detective "knew or should have known that there was no reasonable basis for the use of such force." “The bullet basically demolished and disfigured the entire side of his face,” lawyer Daniel Solinsky said. He added that Laviolette has been unable to work since the incident. The young man is facing “astronomical” medical bills, the lawyer added, but did not specify an amount.
“How the heck was Detective DeOtto to figure that out in the wee hours of the morning, when this person’s at his door?” said James Moschella, a Detectives Endowment Association attorney who is repping DeOtto in the shooting's law enforcement probes. However, he is not repping DeOtto in the lawsuit. Moschella said that DeOtto was woken up by someone “not only banging on his door but doing everything he can to break into the house." He added that Laviolette had been banging on the door “for several minutes, at least five minutes, and when that didn’t work he began trying to get into the door holding the handle, exerting force."
DeOtto “was more than reasonable in concluding that this individual was not going to stop until he was inside his house, and could only assume the worst at that time with a wife and two small children upstairs,” Moschella said. “This individual has no one to blame but himself for his actions that night,” he added. Suffolk County police have confirmed that DeOtto, who works in the 115th Precinct in Jackson Heights, Queens, has not been charged in the incident. Laviolette is seeking $25 million in damages as well as an additional $10 million in punitive damages.