Claims Bills a Priority of Mike Haridopolos Advance in House

Two priorities of Senate President Mike Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, have advanced in the House.

Claims bills for Eric Brody and William Dillon got the backing of the House Civil Justice Subcommittee Friday.

Overall, 16 of 17 bills were advanced.

The Senate approved the bills for both Brody and Dillon as the 2012 session opened in January.

HB 445, sponsored in the House by Rep. James Grant, R-Tampa, and in the Senate by Sen. Lizbeth Benacquisto, R-Fort Myers, would require an insurance company to pay $10.75 million for Brody, who requires long-term care after being paralyzed in a vehicle accident more than a decade ago when hit by a Broward County sheriffs deputy.

HB 141, sponsored by Steve Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island, and Haridopolos in the Senate, pays $810,000 to Dillon.

Dillon spent 27 years in jail, wrongly incarcerated for murder.

Efforts to pass the bills failed as the 2011 session came to a contentious end, with the House failing to take up either bill.

Each claims bill has another House committee stop in order to be voted on by the full House.

A number of House members have been philosophically opposed to the state paying claims bills.

Still, the only bill to fail to win committee support was a $1.6 million claim for the mother of an 18-year-old man who died after the car he was in was hit by a vehicle driven by a North Miami police officer. Lawmakers noted that a jury found the driver of the car the man was in had failed to stop at a blinking red light.