Keechant Sewell (Nassau County Police Department)
Dec. 15, 2021 By Allie Griffin
Mayor-elect Eric Adams has named a Queens native as the city’s first female NYPD Commissioner.
Adams announced Wednesday that Keechant Sewell, the Nassau County chief of detectives, will become the top cop of the country’s largest police force next month.
“I’m proud to tell you personally that the 45th police commissioner of the city of New York will be Keechant Sewell,” Adams said in a video statement.
“She’s a native of our city from the great borough of Queens,” he added.
Sewell, 49, was born and raised in the Queensbridge Houses — the largest public housing development in the nation — in Long Island City. She later moved to Corona and then Jamaica as a child and now lives on Long Island, according to the New York Post, which was the first to report on her appointment.
She is a 22-year-veteran of the Nassau County police department and was promoted to chief of detectives last year. She has also led the major case bureau and the professional standards bureau and has worked as an internal affairs investigator as well as the lead hostage negotiator among other jobs.
Adams said he searched for a new commissioner all over the country and had long aspired to appoint a woman for the top position.
“To lead this department into the next chapter of our shared history, I conducted a nationwide search of some of this country’s brightest talents,” he said.
Sewell will take over the job from another Queens native, current NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea, who became commissioner in December 2019. Shea, who was born and raised in Sunnyside, plans to retire from the NYPD at the end of the year.
She will take the reins of the department of 35,000 officers — more than 10 times the size of Nassau county’s 2,400-officer department, according to the New York Times — at a difficult time. Distrust of police officers escalated in the summer of 2020, and racial tensions among officers and the Black community remain high. Furthermore, shootings and murders are up significantly from pre-pandemic levels.
Adams, a former NYPD officer himself, ran and won on a campaign of combating the rise in violence in the city.
He said he believes Sewell is the right person to take on the difficult job of tackling both police abuse and violent crime.
“She not only brings a diverse set of experiences to this moment, but the emotional intelligence needed to lead at this challenging but hopeful time in our city,” Adams said.
With Adams’ latest appointment, many of the city’s top jobs will be held by people who were raised in Queens in the new year. The mayor-elect grew up in South Jamaica and his pick for NYC schools chancellor, David Banks, spent much of his youth in southeast Queens.
The next city council speaker is also all but certain to be a Queens native.
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47 Comments
Congrats and Welcome back to Queens!
I wish Sewell and Adam’s all the best and great success in their positions. That being said when someone announces or prints that they are looking to fill a position for employment but are only considering people of a certain race and sex they are breaking anti discrimination laws and are open to investigation and prosecution from the eeoc. Adams is guilty of this because I’ve seen him on tv say that is what he is doing. of course Adams gets special privilege and every one ignores his violation of the law.
Maybe Adams will appoint a Shea type to be in charge of bike lanes or outside dining. Maybe jimmy can apply.
I hope she stops asian attacks i miss my half asian grandkids. They moved out of nyc after the rise in Asian attacks in nyc.
Thank you Kamala Harris for paving the way.
She reminds me of MC Lyte. The famous rapper from the 80s and the 90s. Good luck to her.
Congratulations! I wish the new administration well!
The first Latino Commissioner of the NYC Department of Correction is Louis Molina. Thank you Mayor Adams.
This decision is wise and important. Our entire society is set up to benefit white men first and every other man second. A man is almost always going to appear to be the best candidate because they’ve gotten 95% of the opportunities to be set up for success. If you don’t give women the opportunities they can’t get the experience and prove their worth. It’s a never-ending cycle and the only way to break it is to set up situations like this where there’s a guarantee someone who isn’t a man gets the job.
Exactly…just look at the NBA & NFL
It doesn’t matter who the PC is when the legislature passes bad bail reform laws, Riker’s gets closed and the DAs don’t prosecute crimes. Plus, the political class in the City has created a very anti-cop climate!!! Until that changes you will see things spiral down even further.
I don’t care about someone’s gender, skin color or religious beliefs … let’s hear their qualifications…
This was a PR hire because if the Media blame her for the City’s Rising Crime rates they will be labeled as “Sexist” and “Racists.”
She gave condolences to the persons family that was killed in Woodside for trying to rob and off-duty police lieutenant on Fox5 news this morning. that says a lot.
…where would I find proof of this claim?
@John J. Lynch. I would post the link but I figure I will get edited. Keechant Sewell was on Good Day, Fox5 NY in the morning with Rosanne Scotto and another cohost during a live stream interview talking about her new position. The interview is labeled as “Incoming NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell” “The Queens native told Good Day New York she wants to bring back the anti-crime unit. She also spoke about moving back to New York City” 12/16. She was asked about the lieutenant being shot in Woodside and the suspect killed. Sewell declined to comment about the case but she went on to say “my condolences to the family of friends to the person that was deceased.” That is at around 1 min and 30 seconds. Its still on their site. Btw she is not a believer in enforcing low level crimes with the anti-crime unit. She is wonderful. Most people dont care about low level crimes until there are a victim and find out that cops do not care when they are a victim.
Sara and John- https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YsZ8-Bl0TP8 The new commissioner did give condolences to the family of the deceased but was quite clear her loyalties were with the wounded officer. Some people want the US to become a country that bullies, berate and even financially destroy the families of perps, like China, Sudan, Palestinian and Saudi Arabia, just to name a few.
We all know how similar stories turned out. A former president smeared and replaced by a great president now running our country ( Sarcasm ). This story is best left to time. Let see how things slowly unfold on their own.
….the Orange Menace tried to overturn an election, and you’re OK with that, just to be clear?
Smeared you say?? Stop tuning into Fox News because it’s rotting your brain! That “smeared” ex-fake-President is responsible for hundreds of thousands of COVID deaths, just to name one crime against humanity. Who in their right mind could support a murderer and lifetime criminal??
More people have died since senile Biden took office
Facts matter
There have been more covid deaths in 2021 with a vaccine under Joe Biden than in all of 2020 without a vaccine under President Trump…I thought sleepy Joe was gonna end covid??
Woke- The pandemic of the unvaccinated. The cure is the vaccine. Fact ! Fox and Right wing media tell its followers not to take vaccines (the cure) while they partake in vaccines and you weak minded gullible fools listen. It’s called Darwinism. Right wing is thinning the herd. Enjoy and remember you are loved by Republicans and their propaganda wings.
Woke- Sleepy Joe hasn’t even been in office s year yet…He sure did inherit a mess from the orange diaper man. Trump paid $750 in taxes and got the best experimental Covid treatment in the world courtesy of US Gov’t and he still doesn’t want to the government that saved his pathetic life. Just like he refused to serve in its military.
I was hoping that he would appoint Frank Reagan. Seriously though, how much power does the NYPD commissioner actually have? Seems like a symbolic position under complete control of the mayor.
So I guess all the BLM (that includes you white liberals), can now shut up about cops having to live in the boroughs to work for the police dept. Its a joke. This woman lives in and worked in Valley Stream. She will come back to NYC and rent an apartment for show. I’m willing to give her a chance cause she is from da hood and knows how it works, but is she willing to speak honestly about crime and criminals? I doubt it. I already saw her on an interview this morning trying to appeal to both sides of the fence and trying hard so she doesn’t hurt liberal feelings.
John the hero – Yes Valley Stream is so far away. Nobody pulls the wool over your eyes.
Dumb comment, as usual.
I wish her the best. It’s not exactly difficult to improve on what we’ve seen over the last 8 years, but I wish her the best all the same.
It is always better to try to set a first record… when crime is out of control.
I’m sure everyone is just thrilled a black woman is in charge… because she is a black woman.
Congratulations for the well earned victory! you go girl!!! Shea is one of the worst police commissioners nyc ever had. Crime, shootings, quality of life, etc. all are up and continue to climb as he stands around and does nothing. White male fragility is not what this city needs.
Blackness is showing.
Shea’s hands are/were tied… stop and frisk and gang units will improve the situation once Adams brings them back.
It’s amazing that the editors allow comments like this that are racial barbs to be posted. Words like white privilege/frailty are targeted attacks on an entire race meant to disparage and demean. It’s essentially the n-word for whites.
Visit to the fox news website and cry about it. You will find support there.
So your ok with hate and racism… good to know. Basically your saying bigotry against whites is acceptable, shame on you.
Shea was stopped from doing his job by our idiot of a mayor, the city council, the state legislature and the DAs that break their oath of office everyday and refuse to prosecute criminals. I’ll give you one thing, Shea should have resigned in protest. Now we have a Mayor that introduces the new PC while standing in front of a mural depicting a lowlife that murdered a police officer. This city is fu€ked.
Congratulations to her! It’s about time exclamation.
Amazing congrats to her! ??????
You go girl for being our first ever female black commissioner here in New York City. I’m backing her up baby if people are not being considerate then SMH to the misogynistic schmucks. we need more black and brown people to higher positions. I’m glad Adams won the election you go buddy!!
Way to go sis ??May God watch over you ?✨?
Glad no one dares to try to call Adams decision racists like De Blasio’s appointee of Dermot Shea. We need more leaders with emotional stability aka a POC.
I’m glad to see steady appointed African American officials. They’ll pave the way for other ethnicities to step up their game too.
Affirmative action is still alive and well.
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Window dressing !!!! Won’t bring down crime !!!! After Eric Adams is in office we will be all be told that crime is down as they go back to playing with statistics.
They’re playing with statistics now. No corpse? No felony. No firearm discharged? Not a robbery. Burglary = trespassing, robbery = petit larceny, assault = harassment. They’ve been cooking the books for years, but it’s tough to explain dead bodies (COVID notwithstanding), so crime numbers go up. Inexplicably the increase only affects homicide and hate crimes. The other felonies all get knocked down to misdemeanors. Boss can’t take the number, squash it.
NYC Cops, Firemen, Teachers, Electricians, Carpenters, Plumbers….ALL great jobs to help poor people in NYC police, live in or move ahead in life.
Sewell is one of the many finest examples. I hope to see her in a few murals in LIC.