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Judge rules NYPD cop, who already sold his house, can keep job, grants COVID vax religious exemption

By
Priscilla DeGregory
Published Oct. 24, 2022
Updated Oct. 24, 2022, 4:58 p.m. ET

An NYPD cop had his religious exemption from the COVID-19 vaccine mandate granted by a Manhattan judge — but the decision came after the officer had already sold his house “in preparation for the worst,” he told The Post Monday.

The Friday ruling, which allows Officer Christopher Anderson, 33, to keep his job on the force despite not having the jab, is the third such legal victory for NYPD cops who sued over the city’s vaccine requirement.

But the 10-year veteran – who works in the Counterterrorism Bureau based at Randall’s Island — sold the Westchester home he lived in with his wife and 2-year-old daughter a week prior — anticipating he would be fired as the case played out in court.

“We had been doing our best to prepare for months and months,” Anderson said. “It was a surreal feeling knowing that I could lose something that I had worked so hard for and given so much time to.”

“Of course it’s terrible I had to [sell the house] but we will make do,” he added.

NYPD Officer Christopher Anderson
NYPD Officer Christopher Anderson has been granted a religious exemption from the COVID vaccine mandate. Courtesy of Christopher Andersen

Anderson filed suit against the city on Aug. 11 after his request for a religious exemption from the vaccine over his Catholic faith was denied.

He had appealed the city’s decision not to grant the exemption on Dec. 14, but officials rejected the appeal and gave him notice he would be fired.

But Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Arlene Bluth – who last month made a similar ruling allowing NYPD Officer Alexander Deletto to keep his job – sided with Anderson, and overturned the city’s decision for failing to provide him with an explanation for the denial.

“There is no indication that anybody even read [Anderson’s] arguments,” Bluth wrote of the city’s denial.

The city “did not have to compose a three-volume treatise to explain their decision; a brief explanation that acknowledged [Anderson’s] specific request was all that was necessary,” Bluth wrote. “But [the city] did not do that.”

Covid-19 vaccine needle.
Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Arlene Bluth overturned the city’s denial of Anderson’s request for exemption since it didn’t offer any explanation for the decision. U. Baumgarten via Getty Images

Bluth denied the part of Anderson’s lawsuit seeking to overturn the vaccine mandate and finding that his constitutional rights were violated. The judge said she was simply overturning his denial based on the city’s “woeful and underwhelming response.”

Another judge had previously granted Anderson a temporary restraining order on Aug. 15, allowing him to keep his job until the final ruling in the case.

“It’s been a very long year,” Anderson said, noting that his school teacher wife had also lost her job because of the vaccine mandate. He said they are “lucky” that she found a new job only a few months later.

The couple, their daughter and Anderson’s mother-in-law moved into his mom’s home after the sale on their house went through on Oct. 14. He decided to sell, “in preparation for the worse – losing my job,” he said.

“My family and I are feeling very happy today,” Anderson said. “It is just a relief, a weight lifted off my shoulders that I can continue serving the city and working.”

Two other similar favorable rulings in cop cases and a similar ruling in a firefighters case have come down in the last month and a half.

The first such ruling came from Bluth on Sept. 13 finding that Deletto – a 43-year-old Brooklyn cop – should be able to keep his job and be granted a religious exemption as the city had similarly offered no explanation for its denial in his case. The city’s appeal of that ruling is pending.

Then on Sept. 23, Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Lyle Frank granted the city’s largest police unions’ case reinstating its members to their jobs in the NYPD. The city also has an appeal pending in that case.

Earlier this month, a Staten Island judge ruled that city firefighter Timothy Rivicci should get his job back and be granted a religious exemption because the city didn’t offer him an explanation for its denial. The city is appealing that decision as well.

Anderson and Deletto’s lawyer James Mermigis – who’s been dubbed the “anti-shutdown” lawyer for filing a slew of pandemic related litigation – lauded Bluth’s decision.

“We will continue to file lawsuits until everyone that was wrongfully denied an exemption, religious or medical, is vindicated,” Mermigis said.

A spokesperson with the city Law Department pointed out that Bluth’s decision only applies to Anderson’s case and that the judge denied Anderson’s request to invalidate the vaccine mandate as a whole acknowledging that other judges had upheld the mandate.

The NYPD deferred comment to the Law Department.

Additional reporting by Craig McCarthy and Nolan Hicks