Unsettling

City Hall under Mayor de Blasio has grown notorious for the unnecessarily generous cash settlements it doles out to plaintiffs (and their lawyers), especially in NYPD-related cases.

Now that policy may have indirectly led to bloodshed.

Salim Wilson was charged this week with second-degree murder in the shooting death of Julio Velasquez — his co-plaintiff in a civilrights suit growing out of what they contend was a false arrest.

Wilson, who was already in jail on other charges, and also faces a New Jersey warrant for skipping a Garden State court appearance in yet another case, denies the charges.

Cops say the killing came after a fight over money — specifically, more than $50,000 Velazquez and Wilson split as an “advance” from their law firm, whose general counsel is former City Councilman Lew Fidler.

Such “pre-settlement funding” is not unusual in cases where the attorneys are confident of victory or being able to reach a lucrative settlement.

That’s right: Despite the two men’s rap sheets, the lawyers expected to easily win a payout from the de Blasio administration when suing the NYPD.

It does seem a good bet: Back in January, for example, Team de Blasio agreed to shell out $75 million to plaintiffs alleging the department pushed cops to wrongly issue criminal summonses for minor offenses.

Yet the accusers produced no strong evidence to back up their claim, which the city explicitly denied even after settling the case.

And who were the biggest winners? The plaintiffs’ lawyers, of course, to the tune of $18.5 million. (The alleged victims pocketed about $150 each.)

And that was just one in a number of highprofile lawsuits the city has settled on generous terms, including $5.9 million to the family of Eric Garner.

Ironically, the Bloomberg administration made a similar mistake in its early years, settling nuisance cases until it reversed course when this brought a gusher of new suits.

History repeats: City Hall recently instructed the Law Department to start fighting more cases rather than settling them.

But if de Blasio means to send a message, it’s probably far too late.