The City Council voted unanimously Wednesday to back a proposed tweak in state law that will allow the children of a slain NYPD cop to collect her pension — the final hurdle for the bill to go to a vote in Albany.
“My mom embodied the American dream,” said Genesis Villella, who adopted her two younger siblings after her mom, Miosotis Familia, was gunned down execution-style in the Bronx in 2017.
“For years, the city that she grew up in, loved and protected, didn’t love her back,” Villella, 28, said before the vote. “In fact, they tried to erase her and me, but I want to make it known that my mom is a hero and will always be the hero of my lifetime and today, that erasure and discrimination ended.”
The family’s dilemma stemmed from an overlooked and outdated state law that awards lifetime pensions to the spouses and parents of law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty — but makes no mention of their children, a significant oversight for single parents like Familia.
The state proposal would amend the law so that it “provides for children who were under the age of 25 when the death of the member occurred to receive an accidental death benefit for their lifetimes.”
But before legislators in Albany can consider the move, New York City officials have to sign off because state law requires support from the local entity affected by the change.
“Young people like Genesis shouldn’t have to take on the impossible and then be told they’re invisible by the law,” Council Majority Leader Amanda Farias (D-Bronx) said during a press briefing.
“So, what we’ve done here was actually replicate what’s already within the pension system for spouses and other family members of our officers for her children,” Farias said. “And so this will, going forward, help other families in the NYPD.”
For Villella, Wednesday’s vote brings her one step closer to what has been a grueling fight.
“When I was 17, my mom made me promise her that I would take care of my brother and sister if anything were to happen because of the job,” she said. “Because there was a target on her back and every other cop’s back for years.
“I kept my promise to my mom by adopting and raising my brother and sister, Peter and Delilah, and raising them on my own as a mom and a dad when I was barely an adult.”
Villella was a young college student when her mom, a 12-year department veteran, was sitting in a mobile command post on July 5, 2017, when deranged gunman Alexander Bonds walked up and shot her.
Bonds was later shot dead by police.
The tragedy forced Villella to abandon school and focus on raising her twin siblings — both of whom are now enrolled at Marist College, she said.
Villella struggled financially to make ends meet because under the existing law, her brother and sister only qualified for benefits until they turned 21. Villella herself would have earned benefits until she turned 23 had she stayed in college, but she had to drop out to care for her younger siblings.
After Wednesday’s council vote, she is one step away from fulfilling her promise to her mom.
“Now the orphaned children who had no one are going to be receiving the death benefits for the rest of our lifetimes, just like the surviving spouses and the surviving parents,” she said.
“Orphan children, the children who have nobody, are going to be taken care of just the way they should.”
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