NYPD Chief of Department Terence Monahan on Wednesday said New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo called Commissioner Dermot Shea to apologize after the governor said city police failed to do its job during a chaotic Monday night in the city.
“Don’t ever call them ineffective,” Chief Monahan said on NBC’s “Today” program.
He said Mr. Cuomo’s office reached out to apologize to him on Tuesday evening and that the governor called Commissioner Shea directly to apologize.
“That’s not what he meant — that he did not mean to put down the police officers,” Chief Monahan said. “I’d hope he would come out publicly and say that again today.”
Chief Monahan said the earlier curfew on Tuesday helped the department, and that there are groups amid larger protests “looking for nothing but trouble.”
“We’ve made a lot of arrests of people outside the New York area,” he said. “We’ve gotten intel from people that various different groups of anarchists have been out trying to push their agenda out there, to hijack the movement … and just to attack police officers.”
On Tuesday, Mr. Cuomo had said the NYPD and Mayor Bill de Blasio did not do their job on Monday, which saw rampant looting and hundreds of arrests during another night of protests following the Memorial Day killing of George Floyd in Minnesota.
The commissioner had said on Tuesday that the governor’s comments were disgraceful.
Chief Monahan did not say whether Mr. Cuomo offered a similar apology to Mr. de Blasio.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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