Leirer v. Caputo

Rosenblatt, J. (dissenting).

I subscribe fully to the majority’s statements regarding the Comptroller’s authority to protect public funds, but I cannot endorse the extension of the common-law right of recoupment to empower the Comptroller, over the petitioner’s protest, to extract money from her paychecks when he lacked legal authorization, or judicial adjudication or intervention. Indeed, this appears to be the first reported adjudication in the history of American law, and perhaps the common law as well, in which the common-law right of recoupment has served to authorize an official,…