$5 million settlement proposed in case of man who died days after EMTs believed he was “dead on arrival.”

Chicago taxpayers could spend $5 million to compensate the family of a 64-year-old man left for dead by first responders on the floor of his West Side apartment, then found alive by his grandson more than four hours after those emergency medical technicians had left without administering emergency medical care.

As a Chicago Fire Department ambulance was finally transporting Whitfield Marshall from his West Side apartment to Stroger Hospital, the former Marine-turned-auto mechanic suffered a heart attack. Three days later, Marshall’s family decided to take him off life support.

The proposed $5 million settlement is the largest of four on the agenda for Monday’s meeting of the City Council’s Finance Committee.

It would resolve a lawsuit filed against the city by Marshall’s family that identifies emergency medical technicians Michael O’Malley and Thomas Henjowski as the first responders who mistakenly reported Marshall as “dead on arrival.”

The incident began around 1:45 p.m. on Feb. 20, 2019 with a 911 call for a well-being check at 1633 W. Madison St.

According to the lawsuit, O’Malley and Henjowski arrived to find Marshall “laying face down on the floor of his apartment.”

“Believing he was ‘dead on arrival’ they left the Marshall residence” without exercising the “knowledge, skill and care used by reasonably careful EMTs in the same or similar circumstances,” the lawsuit contends.

The lawsuit accuses O’Malley and Henjowki of not only failing to transport Marshall to the emergency room of the nearest hospital, but also of failing to “obtain vital signs from Marshall, including pulse and respiratory rate, blood pressure, oxygen saturation.”

The lawsuit also accuses both emergency medical technicians of failing to: apply cardiac monitors or start an IV; administer respiratory support; initiate cardiopulmonary resuscitation or other advanced cardiac life support protocol and telemetrically report information about their patient to an emergency room physician.

Any one of those emergency measures had at least the potential to save Marshall’s life. Without that care, the EMTs “took his chance” at surviving “away,” the lawsuit contends.

Marshall’s grandson, Gabray Carter, arrived at the apartment more than four hours after the initial 911 call and found his grandfather still alive. Carter could not be reached for comment.

In an interview with WLS-TV (Channel 7) shortly after the incident, Carter said he just wanted one last chance to see the man he called his “best friend and role model” before a funeral home picked up his grandfather’s body — but Marshall was alive and moaning.

“He was moving his arms … I was terrified. I was actually terrified because my best friend was laying on the ground! Helpless!” Carter told the TV station.

“It was crazy, you know? It was something I never saw ever in life. ... I was panicking. … I didn’t know what to do. I just wanted him to get help right then and there.”

With Carter that day was his girlfriend, Julia Morris. Both were in training to become paramedics.

“If I was in that situation, I definitely would have been able to save him if I was the EMT who came the first time,” Carter said.

Chicago Fire Department spokesman Larry Langford refused to comment on the pending settlement.

O’Malley and Henjowski are no longer on the job. One was fired in response to the incident, sources said. The circumstances of the other EMT’s departure was not immediately known.

$2 million proposed for woman injured by falling light pole

The Finance Committee will also be asked to authorize a $2 million settlement to a now 51-year-old woman seriously injured when a light pole fell and struck her leg and hip while she walked on LaSalle Street near the Thompson Center on Nov. 21, 2019.

Maya Kirk’s lawsuit claims the broken leg that required two surgeries and a long and painful recovery was caused by the city’s maintenance negligence and flawed design.

Edward G. Willer, a partner at the law firm of Corboy & Demetrio, said a city official deposed in connection with the lawsuit acknowledged ornamental banners attached to the defective light pole “acted like sails” on what he called a “windy day in November,” putting added stress on the pole.

Also contributing to the accident: “The city approved a design of this pole with this shroud that covered the base of the pole and allowed water to trickle down at its base and accumulate rust,” Willer said.

“Had they gone out there once every two or three years to look at these things,” Willer said, “they would have determined the deplorable condition that these are in.”

Two other settlements — for $300,000 and $375,000 respectively — are also on the Finance Committee’s agenda. One accuses Chicago police officers of excessive force. The other was filed by a man who was a passenger in a vehicle struck by a car driven by a city employee who was going too fast and recklessly and ran through a stop sign.