Syracuse, N.Y. — Onondaga County Sheriff Toby Shelley has ended his lawsuit over who has to pay the legal bills for two lawsuits he filed against the county.
Shelley is paying the more than $100,000 in legal bills out of his office’s budget, according to Thomas Newton, a sheriff’s office spokesperson. He had been trying to get the county to pay the tab.
The sheriff has sued the county over the proposed closure of the Jamesville prison and also over who he can hire as top administrators.
Shelley decided to pay the bills from his office’s budget after seeking guidance from Marty Masterpole, the county comptroller.
Masterpole said Shelley called him one day to ask for advice on how to pay the legal bills. He said he told the sheriff to tap funds from his budget.
The sheriff questioned whether he could do that. Masterpole said he told the sheriff that he could do so.
Most of the money — $120,949 — is coming out of the professional services budget line, Masterpole said. The remainder — $10,778 — is being pulled from revenue generated by inmates making phone calls, he said.
Shelley originally sued the county in September because the top county attorney had declined to pay many of the legal bills the sheriff rang up in state Supreme Court and at an appellate court in Rochester.
Shelley and his office would typically be represented for free by lawyers in the county law department. He had to hire outside lawyers since county lawyers cannot represent both him and the county in the same lawsuit.
Shelley’s legal tab has mounted over the past two years.
He first sued in 2023 to try to stop County Executive Ryan McMahon’s proposal to close the Jamesville Correctional Facility. The proposal was to hold all inmates in the sheriff’s custody in the Onondaga County Justice Center jail in downtown Syracuse.
Justice Joseph Lamendola sided with the county and dismissed Shelley’s lawsuit in April 2024.
Shelley later appealed the lawsuit to the Appellate Division for the Fourth Department, which is based in Rochester. A panel of judges there ruled against him earlier this year.
In late 2023, Shelley sued the county for a second time to try to keep two members of his command staff on the payroll.
The two chief deputies, Melissa Berlinski and Maureen Murphy, had years earlier opted into an early retirement program as the county was facing a budget deficit at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Berlinski and Murphy agreed as part of the program to not “apply” for permanent county jobs in the future.
Shelley hired them in January 2023. He argued the county administrative code gives him the authority to appoint whomever he chooses as deputies.
Justice Robert Antonacci II rejected an attempt by the county to dismiss the lawsuit. It remains pending.
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