For many years, the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission has pursued a dubious and unusual policy of suspending the license of any taxi driver who was arrested (not convicted, just arrested). The TLC did so even if the arrest charge was a misdemeanor that was alleged to have been committed off-duty and had nothing to do with driving a cab— and it did so automatically, no questions asked. This strange practice likely impacts for than a thousand drivers per year.
TLC would always allow the cabbie a post-suspension hearing, ostensibly to determine whether or license should remain suspended while the arrest charges were pending. The catch was for decades these hearings were basically shams no taxi driver was ever reinstated through the hearing process.
But thanks to a lawsuit brought by Dan and an appeal brought by Dan and David Goldberg, the U.S. Court of Appeals. That situation has changed.
Court of Appeals held in 2019 that the City’s hearing process unconstitutional because it systemically denied the drivers due process of law. But not anymore. Now the hearing judges are employed by the City’s Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings or OATH, not by the TLC itself. And for the TLC to extend the suspension of a license, it must prove not just that a criminal charge is pending, but that the driver’s licensure poses a direct and substantial threat to public safety. Drivers suspended on arrest who request a hearing— and a driver must request one— usually win.
At the hearing, the OATH judge considers not just the arrest charge, but the underlying facts and the driver’s record. The judges weigh these factors to determine whether the driver’s licensure poses any real continuing threat to the public that is both “direct” and “substantial”. Many times, the charged crime is the sole infraction in an otherwise spotless record, or it may be technical or mitigated. In any event, when drivers request hearings, they are now reinstated a large majority of the time.
In short, if the TLC suspends your license based on an arrest, if you request a hearing, you have a good chance at reinstatement.
Dan has personally won dozens of these hearings. So if your license has been suspended base on an arrest, especially if your arrest was off-duty, and you want to be reinstated, you should request a hearing, and you should call a lawyer, especially Dan.
Here are a few cases where Dan has won where Dan has won reinstatement for suspended drivers.