Harlem Pol And Exonerated 5 Member To Chair NYPD Oversight: Reports

HARLEM, NY — From serving nearly seven years for a crime he didn't commit to overseeing the very same police department that helped put him in prison.

Newly elected Harlem City Council Member and member of the exonerated Central Park 5, Yusef Salaam, is now the chair of the City Council Public Safety Committee, according to several reports.

The top position on the committee, which oversees the NYPD, is a powerful and high-profile role.And their hearings are often the scene of some of the most heated moments in city council, as they are charged with oversight of the NYPD and other agencies.

The Daily News first reported the news Wednesday evening, but City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams was expected to make things formal at Thursday's stated meeting.

His appointment comes at a time when the Speaker has decided to shake up numerous leadership positions inside City Hall.

Staten Island City Council Member Kamillah Hanks was moved from chairing the Public Safety Committee to chair the Subcommittee on Landmarks, Public Sightings, and Dispositions, reported the Daily News. She will remain as a member of the Public Safety Committee.

“This decision by the speaker comes to no surprise to me. However, I congratulate the new public safety chair,” Hanks said in a statement to the Daily News. “My goal is and has always been to do the job of representing the people of the City of New York and the 49th district.”

Salaam, who was 15 when he was arrested and falsly accused of attacking and rapping a Central Park jogger along with four others in 1989, served six years and eight months behind bars before he was exonerated. While in NYPD custody, the Central Park Five — all between 14 to 16-years-old — were "coerced" into confessing after more than 30 hours of interrogations.

In June, Salaam won a tough Democratic primary against two current state Assembly members after former Harlem Council Member, Kristin Richardson Jordan, dropped out of her re-election campaign.

Right off the bat, Salaam will be squaring off with Mayor Adams and police unions over the recent passage of the so-called "How Many Stops Act," an NYPD reform bill that requires cops to report low-level stops.

On Thursday, Adams, who has been vocal in his opposition to the bill, released a crude cartoon claiming that officers will be doing paperwork instead of solving crimes and even brought up the bill when discussing a manhunt for a recently caught serial stabber.

The bill's sponsor, Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, said that the Mayor was fear mongering.

"It is asinine and insane," Williams said. "It is beyond the pale of anything that I've heard from any previous mayor."

Patch reporter Matt Troutman contributed reporting