Family of dad crushed to death in NYC parking garage collapse sues owners, claim they overpacked the structure

The family of a Manhattan parking garage manager who died last year in a collapse claims the owners of the lot “prioritized profits over safety” by packing it with too many cars, leading to the structural fail.Willis Moore, 59, was tragically killed on April 18, 2023 at the four-story Little Man Parking facility on Ann Street in Lower Manhattan when it caved in on itself, trapping him inside, injuring five others and wrecking dozens of cars.Moore’s brother Ian Moore and his NYPD cop daughter Brittany Moore sued the owners of the facility last week for unspecified damages, claiming the company negligently allowed “many more vehicles than was reasonably safe” to be parked in the 100-year old building, the Manhattan Supreme Court lawsuit alleges.The facility had been on notice about structural problems after it was slapped with “numerous violations” by the city Department of Buildings — including six open citationsfor “sagging beams and cracking concrete,” the filing claims.One of the alleged offenses was “a Class 1 hazardous violation” after an inspector found cracks in the ceiling slab of the first floor — “the same slab that collapsed on April 18, 2023,” the court papers allege.“The building never remedied any of the dangerous conditions cited,” the suit charges.“As a result of this entirely preventable garage collapse, six children lost a father, a mother lost a son, and several siblings lost a brother.”Moore, who worked at the garage for 20 years, was about to get off work around 4:30 p.m.

that day when the collapse occurred around 4:10 p.m.“We believe that the garage owners prioritized profits over people,” family lawyer Benedict Morelli said in a statement.“This incident could have been entirely preventable had the defendants done the right thing and fixed the garage like they were instructed by safety officials to do.”Moore’s daughter Brittany — who was pregnant at the time of his death — wept at his funeral...