Mayor Eric Adams is a “morally corrupt” leader who appointed a band of “clowns” to run his police department and should have no place in City Hall now or in the future, former top cop Tom Donlon fumed exclusively to The Post.
In his first sit-down since filing his bombshell lawsuit alleging a massive criminal operation running out of One Police Plaza, Donlon highlighted various instances of how the police executives he was saddled with as interim police commissioner repeatedly ignored simple orders or would go around him to whine to the mayor.
“The way he handles the city, I would say that he’s morally corrupt,” Donlon said during the wide-ranging, nearly hour-long conversation.
Adams, said Donlon, ignored his police commissioner, who was brought in to help rebuild the image of the NYPD after its top cop was forced to resign following a series of dramatic federal raids.
“I don’t think he’s morally qualified” to hold office, Donlon said — adding that the mayor should “absolutely” not be seeking re-election.
Donlon filed a blockbuster, 231-page lawsuit Wednesday against Adams and a cadre of the mayor’s police cronies, accusing them of running the NYPD like the mob.
The suit contends Donlon, a well-regarded former FBI bigwig, was effectively commissioner in name only as a cabal of corrupt top cops secretly ran the NYPD, rewarding lackeys and punishing enemies.
Adams allegedly turned a blind eye to his friends’ misdeeds — and even told Donlon to ease up on them, the suit claims.
“Back off these guys,” Adams told Donlon during the former interim commish’s first day, according to the suit.
The sprawling lawsuit paints a scathing portrait of the NYPD’s inner workings under former Chief of Department Jeffrey Maddrey, his successor John Chell, current Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Kaz Daughtry and former deputy commissioner in charge of public information Tarik Sheppard — all of whom were close to Adams.
In the hours after the suit was made public, City Hall and police officials attacked Donlon’s record and claimed he was in mental decline.
“Yes, he was showing many signs of cognitive issues that he wasn’t up to the task of being police commissioner,” well-known hothead Sheppard claimed on Pix11 Wednesday evening.
Donlon, who showed no signs of mental decline in the interview, shot back at the comments, calling them “bulls—t.”
“I knew these clowns that I was working with didn’t like the feds, and they wanted to operate in their own world,” Donlon said of the leadership team. “Actually, they’re embarrassing themselves and the mayor doesn’t even understand that.”
Donlon, during his two months as interim top cop, allegedly caught the cabal and their allies using his commissioner’s stamp to promote politically connected officers and wrongfully doling out overtime as rewards for loyalty.
Maddrey resigned amid a shocking sex-for-overtime scandal.
Adams, after the lawsuit dropped, painted Donlon as a disgruntled ex-employee. City Hall officials also badmouthed Donlon, trying to portray him as a doddering old man out of his depth.
But the attempted character assassination contrasted wildly with the praise Adams and City Hall officials heaped on Donlon when he took over the NYPD after Edward Caban resigned in the wake of a stunning federal raid on his home.
Donlon was brought in by Adams in September last year to help clean up the NYPD’s scandal-tainted image.
But the move was undercut a week later when the feds raided Donlon’s home in a search for decades-old classified documents.
Rather than throw Donlon under the bus, city officials trotted out Joseph Pistone, the legendary FBI agent known as “Donnie Brasco” who infiltrated the Mafia in the 1970s and 1980s, to attest to his character.
“I don’t have enough good things to say about the guy,” Pistone said at the time.
