John Chell, the NYPD’s highest-ranking uniformed official, used someone else’s identity in a bid to avoid paying income taxes on money he made while moonlighting as a basketball referee for six years, newly released police disciplinary records reveal. 

The attempted tax dodge was reported to the department by an investigator for the Internal Revenue Service. Chell pleaded guilty to departmental charges of misconduct after a probe found he “willfully attemp[ted] to evade or defeat a federal tax” and was docked 10 vacation days in 2013, according to the records. 

The IRS had investigated whether the identity Chell used to file taxes for the referee gig between 1997 and 2003 was stolen, but the NYPD records said he moonlit under the names of family .

The case was among 11 internal investigations that Chell, the NYPD’s Chief of Department, faced over his 31 years with the force, according to the records.

The documents, which were reviewed by THE CITY, were obtained through a public disclosure law request by attorneys representing Giovonnie Mayo, a Brooklyn man who was run over by an unmarked police car in a pursuit in Brownsville last May. 

Mayo spent 44 days on a ventilator, during which time the NYPD had him shackled to his hospital bed, according to the lawsuit filed in Brooklyn federal court. He now has permanent brain damage.

Also revealed in the records is a second guilty plea by Chell in 2005 following an internal investigation for “being absent from [his] assignment without permission or police necessity.” 

This came after a fellow officer accused him of having “someone sign him in and go out for the night drinking.” The complaint said he had “someone else sign him out” and that he earned overtime “without being present.” 

The department did not substantiate overtime abuse in that case but established a “misuse of time,” according to Chell’s Comprehensive Officer History, one of the documents obtained by Mayo’s lawyers. He did not appear to have faced any discipline for the substantiated charge. 

In another guilty plea on internal charges, Chell was docked seven vacation days in 2008 for using an NYPD vehicle to drive around an unidentified person without authorization, though the details of that allegation aren’t contained in the records. 

Chell and a spokesperson for the NYPD didn’t immediately return requests for comment.

‘Extremely Concerning’

Mayo’s federal lawsuit, which references Chell’s disciplinary records, charges him with defamation for holding a press conference after the crash where he claimed that Mayo “displayed a firearm and pointed it at a female.” But, according to the suit, Mayo was unarmed, no weapon was recovered, and the woman in question said the two were just talking.

Cassandra Rohme, an attorney representing Mayo, said Chell’s lengthy disciplinary record raises troubling questions about officer discipline. 

“Chell’s record indicates a failure to discipline NYPD officers to frankly a level that is extremely concerning,” she said. “It makes me concerned about what else is out there if this is the person in charge.”

Under the leadership of Mayor Eric Adams, Chell has steadily climbed to the top alongside his friend Chief Jeffrey Maddrey. 

Under former NYPD Commissioner Edward Caban, Chell, then the chief of patrol, became a highly visible presence, putting out his own videos on official s and emerging as an unabashed online critic of politicians and journalists he sometimes called cop-haters. 

He was also a regular commentator on right-wing television channels Newsmax and Fox. 

As THE CITY previously reported, Chell shot a man in the back in 2008 in what the department found was an accidental discharge. But a Brooklyn civil jury later ruled that the shooting had been intentional, and awarded the victim’s family what became a $1.5 million dollar payout.

Chell is the architect of announced new restrictions on the chase policy in January.

His promotion came after Maddrey, another close Adams ally, abruptly resigned in December after a subordinate accused him of pressuring her into a sex-for-overtime arrangement. 

Tisch would have had access to Chell’s lengthy disciplinary file ahead of her decision to promote him to the top uniformed spot in the NYPD. She has otherwise made significant changes to the leadership of the department.

Chell was also the subject of a city Department of Investigation report in January blasting his “unprofessional” social media posts on official NYPD s attacking politicians, journalists (including an editor at THE CITY) and others last year. 

A log of internal complaints made about Chell obtained by Mayo’s attorneys appears to show six pending complaints since the start of 2024, including one for selling NYPD-branded paraphernalia, two allegations of on-duty retaliation, and one off-duty social media violation.  

This weekend, Chell posted a picture to his personal social media of himself and Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Kaz Daughtry golfing with President Donald Trump at one of his golf courses. The New York Post later reported that the president, who’d already sent the military into Los Angeles, said he was concerned about protests in New York and that “Chell reassured the president that any demonstrations in the city would not get out of hand.”  

As for Mayo, he’s able to walk again but is still virtually unable to communicate verbally, according to his lawyer Rohme.

“It’s a miracle that he’s alive at this point,” Rohme said.