City lawyers went to court on Thursday to ask a judge to toss a jury verdict that awarded $2.2 million to the family of a mentally unstable man who was shot to death by cops after his mother called for an ­ambulance.

Law Department attorney Joshua Lax told Manhattan federal Judge Kevin Castel that the jury’s November 2017 decision should be ignored because it erred in finding the city and the police liable in the 2012 shooting of Mohamed Bah.

The reason, city lawyers claim, was that there was no evidence presented at trial that the police responding to the call acted inappropriately.

“There was no evidence that disputes Mr. Bah posed a threat of death or serious injury at the time [NYPD Detective Edwin] Mateo fired,” Lax told the judge.

Lax requested that the jury’s verdict, which included a $2.2 million payout, be tossed or that a new trial be ordered.

Bah’s mother, Hawa Bah, sued the city in 2013 claiming cops wrongfully killed her mentally ill son after she called for an ambulance because he had been acting strangely. Instead of getting medical help, the 28-year-old student and taxi driver was carried out on a stretcher with eight bullet wounds.

It later emerged that cops shot Bah in his Harlem apartment after prying his door open to see what he was doing inside.

The NYPD claimed police only shot Bah because he lunged at Mateo with a 13-inch knife.

But Mateo later testified that he could not remember being stabbed — and the knife was never produced as evidence because it had been contaminated in a storage warehouse due to Hurricane Sandy.

Castel will rule on the matter at a later date.

But he pushed back at the city’s claim during Thursday’s hearing, saying the civil jury had every right to decide it didn’t believe Mateo’s story that he fired at Bah because he feared for his life.

“Isn’t a jury entitled to say, ‘I don’t believe this guy? I don’t believe this guy because he has contradicted himself?’ ” Castel said of Mateo.

“They were absolutely in their right to shake their head and say, ‘It didn’t happen that way.’ ”

In addition to finding Mateo liable for excessive force, the jury found NYPD Lt. Michael Licitra liable for failing to supervise Mateo. The other officers at the scene were cleared of liability.

Outside court Thursday, Hawa Bah said she feels “bad” that the city is trying to snatch the measure of justice she won in court.

“The fact that this city, this mayor and this police department is fighting this case so hard is a travesty,” said Bah lawyer Randolph McLaughlin. “Stop this insanity and let this case go.”