Keechant Sewell resigned as commissioner of the New York City Police Department Monday, suddenly and without providing details about the reasons for stepping down. After a little more than a year and six months in the position, the first woman to serve as NYPD commissioner said goodbye to her colleagues in a brief note.
According to local government sources quoted by the New York Post, his resignation caught the rest of the department completely by surprise. Sewell's tenure at the top of the NYPD was not without controversy, despite its brief duration. A tense atmosphere set in early on, when Sewell was sworn in in front of a mural commemorating Assata Shakur, a member of the Black Liberation Army (BLA), an armed gang convicted of killing a state trooper on a New Jersey highway.
Surprise resignation
"Since I joined you almost a year and a half ago we have faced tremendous tragedy, challenges and triumphs together," Sewell wrote to the staff of nearly 55,000 police and civilian workers who make up the department she led until Monday.
Sewell was appointed in January 2022 by Eric Adams. In her absence, other officials will temporarily take over her duties, though it is not yet known who. The New York City Police Department is the largest local police force in the country. It faces rising crime and a Democratic government that has failed to take action.
The challenge of crime in New York
In April 2023, the House Judiciary Committee heard from a panel of those affected by district attorneys’ alleged "soft hand" in New York, Alvin Bragg among them. Although the overall crime rate increased 23% between January 2022 and January 2023, during Sewell’s tenure, murders and shootings were down by 13% and 17%, respectively.
Within hours of Sewell's resignation being made public, Mayor Adams' office in turn issued a statement thanking Sewell for her year and a half of service. "Her efforts played a leading role in this administration's tireless work to make New York City safer," Eric Adams said in his Monday release.
According to a New York Post exclusive, the relationship between Sewell and the rest of the Adams administration had been deteriorating for several months, leading to the former commissioner's resignation. According to the same sources, Eric Adams knew nothing of the resignation until Sewell announced it.
