TROY – The city will pay $1.3 million to a woman who was seriously injured after trespassing at the city-owned derelict Leonard Hospital to watch fireworks in 2016 and then falling 20 feet off a ledge.

The City Council voted 6-0 Thursday to pay Victoria Brothers, 20, the settlement to resolve the outstanding lawsuit that was filed after the Independence Day accident.

Corporation Counsel James Caruso advised the council members that two state Supreme Court justices had indicated the case might have cost the city as much as $5 million if it was to go to trial. The negotiated settlement was reached in mid-September but there were paperwork delays resulting in its late presentation to the council for a vote.

Caruso told the council he feared a large award against the city if a jury sympathized with Brothers for suffering severe neurological injuries. He said the city probably faced the most exposure for a large financial loss in this lawsuit than any of the others filed against it.

The city will pay $317,000 from its self-insurance reserved toward the $1.3 million settlement. Argonaut Insurance Company, the city’s insurance company, will cover the remaining $983,000.

“John Bailey of the law firm of Bailey, Johnson & Peck, P.C., outside counsel retained (by) Argonaut Insurance Company, has advised that, should this case go to a trial, the City’s liability could be extensive, particularly in light of plaintiff’s permanent injuries and future economic loss,” according to the memo written by Caruso explaining the settlement.

Earlier this year, Acting State Supreme Court Justice Henry Zwack ruled the city was negligent in Brothers’ case when it didn’t secure the neglected hospital property on 74 New Turnpike at the far north end of the city. The city took the hospital site in 2012 for unpaid property taxes. The building dates back to 1972 and has been closed for about 20 years.

Zwack said in his decision "...there is simply no question that the defendant City had actual notice of the dangerous condition, and attractive nuisance, of the abandoned former Leonard Hospital. Instead of effectively abating the hazards the property presented, or demolishing the vacant building, the City persisted in repeating the same inadequate measures -- such as repeatedly replacing plywood over the same windows that was repeatedly removed by trespassers -- thus failing to properly secure the property."

The city awarded a contract of nearly $1.6 million in June to knock down the decaying hospital building to clear the 6.43-acre site for redevelopment. The city could have sold the property for $1 in 2017 to The Community Builders but the council rejected the deal.

This is the second case involving an injured trespasser at Leonard Hospital that the city has settled. In July, the council approved a $120,000 payment to Jaclyn Meyers of Onondaga County for injuries she suffered when she fell through a skylight on June 14, 2014 at the building.