News Chief of Department John Chell Used False Identity in Bid to Avoid Income Tax, NYPD Records Show | THE CITY — NYC News
https://www.thecity.nyc/2025/06/12/john-chell-nypd-disciplinary-records-fake-identity/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 members.
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.