Thomas Valva's mother, Justyna Zubko-Valva, rejects $3M settlement from Suffolk in son's hypothermia death
Thomas Valva appears in an undated photograph. Credit: Courtesy Justyna Zubko-Valva
The mother of Thomas Valva rejected an offer from Suffolk County to settle a $200 million lawsuit against officials she alleges ignored years of warnings of abuse, beatings, starvation and neglect before the 8-year-old autistic boy died of hypothermia in January 2020 after being forced by his father and his fiancee to sleep in their unheated Center Moriches garage, newly filed court documents show.
The rejected $3 million offer was disclosed in a 108-page motion Justyna Zubko-Valva filed on her own behalf as the federal lawsuit grinded to a halt this week when her attorney was granted permission to exit the case. Zubko-Valva, of Valley Stream, also disclosed in her filing that she was willing to settle the case for $30 million. When she learned the $3 million covered all defendants in the case, settlement talks broke down, the court filing shows.
In Zubko-Valva’s motion filed Saturday, she called the county’s $3 million offer “humiliating.” She argued that after she would have paid her lawyer, Jon Norinsberg of Manhattan, his fees, the settlement would “leave almost nothing” for her two surviving children.
“Was this your grand plan from the beginning of this case to ensure that my children, who suffered such tremendous and horrific abuse that resulted in my son Tommy’s brutal murder, would be left with nothing?” Zubko-Valva asked her attorney in a July email. “That’s unspeakable and shameful.”
Norinsberg said a “complete breakdown” occurred this year over “sharp disagreements” between him and Zubko-Valva over “case strategy, the scope of discovery and the best way to move forward in this case.”
U.S. Magistrate Judge Arlene Lindsay on Thursday stayed the case until Jan. 14 to give Zubko-Valva two months to find a new lawyer.
“It is well-settled that a lawyer may seek to withdraw when the client renders it unreasonably difficult for the lawyer to carry out [such] employment effectively,” Lindsay wrote in her decision. “Where a client’s relationship with its attorney has deteriorated to such an extent that continued representation would be inappropriate the motion [to withdraw as attorney] should be granted.”
The attorney change comes more than three years after Zubko-Valva filed her $200 million claim against Suffolk, several of its Child Protective Services employees, East Moriches school officials and several attorneys tasked with protecting Thomas Valva and his two brothers. Zubko-Valva was going through a bitter divorce proceeding and custody battle with the boys’ father, Michael Valva, a former NYPD officer who is serving a 25-years-to-life sentence for the murder of Thomas. Valva’s fiancee, Angela Pollina, is serving the same sentence for her role in the boy’s death, and she and Valva are also defendants in the civil suit.
A contract included in the Zubko-Valva filing shows Norinsberg was to receive 33 1/3% of the total amount recovered from the lawsuit, a standard fee in such cases, plus $650 per hour in attorney’s fees. Lindsay’s decision notes that Norinsberg intends to pursue a lien for work performed on the case.
Norinsberg first informed the court of his desire to exit the case, along with co-counsel Jin-Young Han, in a Sept. 22 letter. In an email Thursday, Norinsberg told Newsday he had “no comments to make, as the record speaks for itself.”
“I sincerely wish Ms. Valva and her children the best of luck in the future,” Norinsberg wrote.
Suffolk officials did not respond to request for comment.
Two Suffolk juries found Thomas died after Michael Valva and Pollina forced him and his brother Anthony to sleep in the unheated garage at their home as temperatures outside fell to just 19 degrees.
Authorities have said all three Valva boys, including brothers Anthony and Andrew, were frequently denied food or access to toilets, and often were sent to school in soiled, urine-soaked clothing. Prosecutors described the Valva and Pollina home on Bittersweet Lane as a “house of horrors.”
A special grand jury was impaneled to investigate the circumstances surrounding Thomas’ death and make recommendations on reforming Child Protective Services, the judiciary and law enforcement. The county also appointed committees to investigate the death and propose reforms.
But a Newsday investigation published in May revealed that more than three years after the boy’s death, some investigations into the county's child-welfare system that were promised had not been completed or never started.
The state has not released a report that is critical of Suffolk Child Protective Services and the county district attorney's office, led first by former Suffolk County District Attorney Timothy Sini and now under Ray Tierney, has not released findings of the investigation that was promised.
The Newsday investigation also found that three Suffolk County Child Protective Services employees who played key roles in the agency’s investigations into abuse allegations against Valva and Pollina were promoted after the boy’s death.
The saga of the boy’s death shook their Center Moriches community and garnered significant media attention during the two trials held late last year and in the spring. At Valva’s sentencing last December, since-retired Supreme Court Justice William Condon pondered from the bench, “How did all of us, as a community, allow this to happen?”
“I acknowledge, this is not the appropriate forum to have that discussion, but it needs to happen,” the judge said. “An 8-year-old boy who right now should be getting excited for Christmas is dead. I speak to everybody out there, we can never let this happen again.”
The mother of Thomas Valva rejected an offer from Suffolk County to settle a $200 million lawsuit against officials she alleges ignored years of warnings of abuse, beatings, starvation and neglect before the 8-year-old autistic boy died of hypothermia in January 2020 after being forced by his father and his fiancee to sleep in their unheated Center Moriches garage, newly filed court documents show.
The rejected $3 million offer was disclosed in a 108-page motion Justyna Zubko-Valva filed on her own behalf as the federal lawsuit grinded to a halt this week when her attorney was granted permission to exit the case. Zubko-Valva, of Valley Stream, also disclosed in her filing that she was willing to settle the case for $30 million. When she learned the $3 million covered all defendants in the case, settlement talks broke down, the court filing shows.
In Zubko-Valva’s motion filed Saturday, she called the county’s $3 million offer “humiliating.” She argued that after she would have paid her lawyer, Jon Norinsberg of Manhattan, his fees, the settlement would “leave almost nothing” for her two surviving children.
“Was this your grand plan from the beginning of this case to ensure that my children, who suffered such tremendous and horrific abuse that resulted in my son Tommy’s brutal murder, would be left with nothing?” Zubko-Valva asked her attorney in a July email. “That’s unspeakable and shameful.”
WHAT TO KNOW
- The mother of Thomas Valva rejected an offer from Suffolk County to settle a $200 million lawsuit against officials she alleges ignored years of warnings of abuse, beatings, starvation and neglect before the 8-year-old autistic boy died of hypothermia in January 2020, newly filed court documents show.
- The rejected $3 million offer was disclosed in a 108-page motion Justyna Zubko-Valva filed Saturday. The court filing also states Zubko-Valva was willing to settle the case for $30 million, but when she learned the $3 million covered all defendants in the case, settlement talks broke down.
- Zubko-Valva called the county’s $3 million offer “humiliating.”
Norinsberg said a “complete breakdown” occurred this year over “sharp disagreements” between him and Zubko-Valva over “case strategy, the scope of discovery and the best way to move forward in this case.”
U.S. Magistrate Judge Arlene Lindsay on Thursday stayed the case until Jan. 14 to give Zubko-Valva two months to find a new lawyer.
“It is well-settled that a lawyer may seek to withdraw when the client renders it unreasonably difficult for the lawyer to carry out [such] employment effectively,” Lindsay wrote in her decision. “Where a client’s relationship with its attorney has deteriorated to such an extent that continued representation would be inappropriate the motion [to withdraw as attorney] should be granted.”
Justyna Zubko-Valva, mother of Thomas Valva, speaks outside Suffolk County Court in Riverhead in 2020. Credit: James Carbone
The attorney change comes more than three years after Zubko-Valva filed her $200 million claim against Suffolk, several of its Child Protective Services employees, East Moriches school officials and several attorneys tasked with protecting Thomas Valva and his two brothers. Zubko-Valva was going through a bitter divorce proceeding and custody battle with the boys’ father, Michael Valva, a former NYPD officer who is serving a 25-years-to-life sentence for the murder of Thomas. Valva’s fiancee, Angela Pollina, is serving the same sentence for her role in the boy’s death, and she and Valva are also defendants in the civil suit.
A contract included in the Zubko-Valva filing shows Norinsberg was to receive 33 1/3% of the total amount recovered from the lawsuit, a standard fee in such cases, plus $650 per hour in attorney’s fees. Lindsay’s decision notes that Norinsberg intends to pursue a lien for work performed on the case.
Norinsberg first informed the court of his desire to exit the case, along with co-counsel Jin-Young Han, in a Sept. 22 letter. In an email Thursday, Norinsberg told Newsday he had “no comments to make, as the record speaks for itself.”
“I sincerely wish Ms. Valva and her children the best of luck in the future,” Norinsberg wrote.
Suffolk officials did not respond to request for comment.
Two Suffolk juries found Thomas died after Michael Valva and Pollina forced him and his brother Anthony to sleep in the unheated garage at their home as temperatures outside fell to just 19 degrees.
Authorities have said all three Valva boys, including brothers Anthony and Andrew, were frequently denied food or access to toilets, and often were sent to school in soiled, urine-soaked clothing. Prosecutors described the Valva and Pollina home on Bittersweet Lane as a “house of horrors.”
A special grand jury was impaneled to investigate the circumstances surrounding Thomas’ death and make recommendations on reforming Child Protective Services, the judiciary and law enforcement. The county also appointed committees to investigate the death and propose reforms.
But a Newsday investigation published in May revealed that more than three years after the boy’s death, some investigations into the county's child-welfare system that were promised had not been completed or never started.
The state has not released a report that is critical of Suffolk Child Protective Services and the county district attorney's office, led first by former Suffolk County District Attorney Timothy Sini and now under Ray Tierney, has not released findings of the investigation that was promised.
The Newsday investigation also found that three Suffolk County Child Protective Services employees who played key roles in the agency’s investigations into abuse allegations against Valva and Pollina were promoted after the boy’s death.
The saga of the boy’s death shook their Center Moriches community and garnered significant media attention during the two trials held late last year and in the spring. At Valva’s sentencing last December, since-retired Supreme Court Justice William Condon pondered from the bench, “How did all of us, as a community, allow this to happen?”
“I acknowledge, this is not the appropriate forum to have that discussion, but it needs to happen,” the judge said. “An 8-year-old boy who right now should be getting excited for Christmas is dead. I speak to everybody out there, we can never let this happen again.”
Grant Parpan covers Suffolk County courts and federal courts for Newsday. A Long Island native, he joined Newsday in 2022.
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