A raid on the house of the Large Apple’s interim police commissioner has raised eyebrows – coming simply days after he took the job and as investigations swirl round Adams administration officers, The Put up has discovered.
Interim commissioner Thomas Donlon mentioned in a Saturday night time assertion that federal authorities had taken from him “supplies that got here into my possession 20 years in the past and are unrelated to my work with the New York Metropolis Police Division” — one week after his predecessor stepped down over a seemingly unrelated raid.
Sources informed The Put up that brokers had been trying to find categorized paperwork Donlon might have introduced dwelling throughout his years with the FBI and the Division of Homeland Safety — however that clarification has left quite a lot of regulation enforcement officers scratching their heads.
“The identical federal companies that ‘really useful’ Donlon to Adams additionally executed the warrant — lower than every week after Donlon’s appointment — to look his home for 20-year-old paperwork,” one supply mentioned, including that Southern District of New York head Damian Williams really backed Mayor Eric Adams’ commish selection earlier than he introduced it.
“I can hear the brokers laughing whereas they’re torturing the mayor,” the supply continued. “It’s open season on Adams on the SDNY and FBI.”
The identical supply mentioned Donlon “clearly pissed off the mistaken folks on the FBI,” which led the investigators to throw “one other grenade in Adams’ lap and pull the [pin].”
“Donlon was collateral harm,” the supply mentioned.
Adams tapped Donlon, an NYPD outsider, to take over as town’s interim commissioner on Sept. 12 — the identical day former commissioner Edward Caban abruptly resigned due to a federal investigation that has targeted on him, his brother and several other different shut allies and prime lieutenants of the embattled mayor.
Federal brokers had seized Caban’s digital gadgets as a part of what sources say is a sweeping corruption probe into potential affect peddling — an inquiry that’s additionally ensnared Deputy Mayor for Public Security Phil Banks, Colleges Chancellor David Banks and their brother Terence Banks, in addition to former NYPD official Tim Pearson and First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright.
None have been accused of crimes and it’s nonetheless not clear if the investigations are linked to at least one one other.
Donlon — who had been working a personal safety firm following his retirement from federal service — was yanked again into the general public eye by his appointment as New York’s prime cop.
On Sunday, Donlon ignored The Put up as he walked out of his Higher East Facet residence — and refused to reply questions concerning the raid.
Some sources mentioned the raid on his place was the feds’ means of telling Adams that no one in his orbit is protected.
However others claimed it was simply the results of a vetting course of for renewed clearances — criminality had nothing to do with it.
Not everybody believed that although.
“They don’t search your home once they do safety clearance,” mentioned Joseph Pistone, the legendary FBI agent generally known as “Donnie Brasco” who infiltrated the Mafia within the Seventies and Nineteen Eighties.
“If I had been doing a background ingestion on Tom, I’d say he’s easy and loves his nation,” mentioned Pistone, who’s identified Donlon since 1974.
“I’m flabbergasted. He’s been out of the bureau for 15 years, and take a look at all of the positions he’s had,” he continued. “I don’t have sufficient good issues to say concerning the man.
“And now he will get appointed police commissioner, and every week later he will get his home searched,” he mentioned. “I do not know why they’d do a search at his home. It’s nuts.”
Mark Carroll, a former assistant US legal professional and retired FBI agent, echoed Pistone’s phrases when he referred to as Donlon an “upstanding member of the regulation enforcement group, and as principled an individual as they arrive.”
“That is mindless,” Carroll mentioned of the raid. “I had the very best degree of clearance. I’ve no good approach to clarify it.
“It might completely shock me if he did something mistaken.”
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