Former Interim NYPD Commissioner Thomas Donlon filed an explosive federal lawsuit Wednesday, alleging that Mayor Eric Adams and several of his associates he made department leaders functioned as a criminal “racketeering” enterprise.
Donlon said the officials’ efforts to consolidate power and punish dissent included promoting unqualified but politically connected officers — including by forging Donlon’s approval using his official commissioner’s stamp — and retaliating against him by sidelining him and even falsely arresting his wife.
In addition to Adams, the 251-page complaint names three current members of the department — Chief of Department John Chell, Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Kaz Daughtry and First Deputy Commissioner Tania Kinsella — and two former high level chiefs, Deputy Commissioner Tarik Sheppard and Chief of Department Jeffery Maddrey.
“This lawsuit is not a personal grievance. It is a statement against a corrupt system that betrays the public, silences truth, and punishes integrity,” Donlon said in a statement.
In the suit filed by attorney John Scola, Donlon described Mayor Adams as “a leader who appeared to lack even the most basic sense of ethics, integrity or moral responsibility,” accusing him of deliberately ignoring complaints about the profligate conduct of the NYPD chiefs who are his longtime cronies, leading them to believe they could do whatever they wanted with impunity.
“Rather than working to reform or stabilize the department… Adams empowered individuals with known histories of abuse and misconduct while dismantling the careers and credibility of those who spoke out,” the suit charges.
City Hall spokesperson Kayla Mamelak-Altus said the city will respond in court to what she characterized as “absurd” claims.
“These are baseless accusations from a disgruntled former employee who — when given the opportunity to lead the greatest police department in the world — proved himself to be ineffective,” she said. “This suit is nothing more than an attempt to seek compensation at the taxpayer’s expense after Mr. Donlon was rightfully removed from the role of interim police commissioner.”
Donlon served as interim police commissioner from mid-September to late November of 2024, when he was moved to a position as a public safety advisor to Adams. That position was eliminated on May 9, the filing in Manhattan Federal Court says.
Prior to that role, Donlon had a long career in law enforcement with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Office of Homeland Security for New York State.
His lawsuit follows one filed last week by four former NYPD chiefs who claim they were retaliated against by the Adams administration after they blew the whistle on corruption within the department’s highest ranks.
‘Fraudulent’ Promotions
Donlon details chaotic months during which four top policing officials who were close with Adams — former police commissioner Edward Caban, former chief of department Maddrey, former deputy mayor for public safety Phil Banks and former mayoral senior advisor Tim Pearson — all resigned after their houses were raided by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Remarkably, Donlon’s homes were also raided by the FBI during that period, reportedly seeking old documentation from his time at the agency. To date, no charges have been filed as a result of any of those raids.
The heart of his lawsuit details his claims that top Adams allies within the NYPD, including Maddrey, Sheppard, and Chell, along with Deputy Chief Anthony Marino, revised Donlon’s list of which NYPD members should be promoted without his knowledge.
It alleges that those officials replaced many of the names on Donlon’s promotion list with cronies and allies — including Maddrey’s chief of staff, Marino’s romantic partner and Sheppard himself.
In some cases, they achieved this by using a copy of the commissioner’s official signature stamp, which Donlon at one point learned Marino possessed, to make it appear as though the list they altered had the commissioner’s approval.
Donlon claims he wasn’t able to view the final promotion lists that were wrongly submitted in his name.
“Promotions that should have been earned through merit and civil service testing were instead knowingly criminally provided as political favors, resulting in unearned raises, inflated pensions, and enhanced access to overtime and benefits with absolutely no NYPD oversight,” the lawsuit says.
The complaint says Sheppard essentially promoted himself from a two- to a three-star chief, including by “fraudulently” imprinting Donlon’s signature stamp on a promotion memo, and that Adams and Maddrey denied approving Sheppard’s promotion when Donlon confronted them about it.
But Donlon said Sheppard wasn’t disciplined or demoted by either of them. The lawsuit says Donlon ordered Sheppard to stop wearing the third star on his collar, but he refused, and that Sheppard denied using the commissioner’s stamp by allegedly telling him: “I did not take your damn stamp. Hell no.”
The lawsuit says Sheppard was only demoted after an incident at the New York City Marathon in early November 2024, when during a photo-op Donlon bumped Sheppard’s arm, prompting Sheppard to allegedly lunge at him and shout, “I will fucking kill you.”
Donlon said he approached Adams directly about the promotion swaps and Sheppard’s actions at the marathon, but that Adams failed to do anything to correct it.
Although current NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch isn’t named as a defendant in the lawsuit, Donlon complains that she too has failed to correct the “injustice” of the swapped promotions even though he’s reached out to her about it numerous times. However, after Adams appointed Tisch commissioner, Sheppard was demoted, according to the New York Post.
The NYPD didn’t respond to a request for comment about the claim against Tisch, who replaced Donlon in late November.
Sheppard didn’t respond to a voicemail seeking comment, and Maddrey, Chell and Daughtry didn’t respond to messages seeking comment. Pearson’s attorney, Hugh Mo, declined to comment.
Marino wasn’t immediately able to be reached for comment.
Evidence Mess
The lawsuit also reveals Donlon’s concerns about the state of the half-dozen warehouses around the city where the NYPD stores evidence. After a December 2023 fire at a warehouse in Red Hook, Brooklyn, Donlon learned the fire destroyed “an unknown quantity of biological evidence, including crucial DNA tied to burglaries, shootings and other unsolved crimes.”
This evidence was “haphazardly piled in cardboard boxes and paper barrels, devoid of proper labeling, fireproof storage or any systematic categorization.” Aisles were unmarked, logs “non-existent” — a chaotic situation he described as “a profound risk to justice.”
Donlon says he brought his concerns to Maddrey, Chell, Daughtry and Kinsella, demanding action. He claims Maddrey was “livid” that Donlon had visited other warehouses, and that ultimately by the time he’d left, no action was taken to address the issues he raised.
Donlon also makes allegations against another longtime Adams ally, Phil Banks, whose home was raided and phone was seized by the FBI and city Department of Investigation in September.
In his lawsuit, Donlon claims Banks showed up at police headquarters at One Police Plaza on Nov. 6, the day after President Donald Trump was re-elected, “to lobby for a pass on his investigations.”
“Banks was heard to say ‘He [Adams] is getting a pass now, what about me?’” the lawsuit claims.
At the time, Banks had retired from City Hall and was living out of state. Reached by THE CITY Wednesday, Banks stated, “That’s an unequivocal lie. Not a mistake. A lie. I have never met with IAB in my time there. Two, I wasn’t in New York that week. I never spoke to anybody about a pass because I don’t need a pass. I did not do anything wrong — not even a little bit.”
Banks called Donlon’s lawsuit “a pure and simple cash grab, very similar to [former Deputy Chief Christopher] McCormack’s, and they both will have to answer for it.”
McCormack was among the four chiefs who filed lawsuits last week. His alleged that about a dozen unqualified, unvetted associates of Adams’ cronies were placed in the Criminal Task Force Division he led over his objections.
Wife’s Arrest
The 251-page lawsuit details a host of other humiliations and acts of alleged insubordination and retaliation that Donlon says he suffered during his brief tenure in city government.
The list includes multiple instances of Maddrey, Chell, Daughtry and Sheppard ignoring Donlon’s direct orders and claims that Sheppard directed Donlon’s security detail and other personnel to bypass Donlon and come to him instead on most matters.
Donlon also claims that Sheppard, with the assistance of a top aide to Adams, illegally halted the transfer of 10 NYPD members that Donlon had ordered, even though the commissioner has sole authority over such decisions.
Donlon claims that not only was he prohibited from assigning his own staff, but that the personnel that were assigned to him were covertly relaying his whereabouts and sharing his emails with Maddrey.
Donlon said he tested the flow of information on two occasions by supplying one of his staffers with false information — and that both times the false info came back to him via Maddrey.
Among the retaliatory incidents that Donlon highlighted in his lawsuit was the arrest of his wife on a minor violation.
Deirdre O’Connor-Donlon was detained by cops on Dec. 16 after she got involved in a car collision with allegedly expired insurance, according to the lawsuit. The lawsuit says she also was found to be driving with a suspended license, based on a paperwork snafu, but that she wasn’t cited for that violation.
Donlon claims the arrest, which only came after the sergeant on scene received a phone call, was retaliatory, and that the incident was leaked to two publications by top department officials right after it happened.
The lawsuit says his wife was issued a summons over the lapsed insurance and released from the local precinct after a few hours.
Among the remedies the lawsuit is seeking is the appointment of an independent monitor to oversee whistle blower protections, promotions and disciplinary decisions within the NYPD.