NEED TO KNOW
- Bernard Kerik, who served as NYPD police commissioner during 9/11, has died at age 69
- Kerik was first hailed as a hero for facilitating the emergency response to the attacks, but later fell from grace due to multiple legal woes
- He pleaded guilty to eight felonies in 2009 and served three years in prison, then was pardoned by President Donald Trump in 2020
Former New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik has died. He was 69.
FBI Director Kash Patel announced news of Kerik’s death in a Thursday, May 29 post on X, noting that Kerik had been in the midst of a “private battle with illness.”
Kerik led the NYPD during the 9/11 terrorist attacks and was widely regarded as a hero for facilitating the department’s response, according to Reuters.
His career was on a steady rise until a series of accusations and investigations in the mid-2000s — including tax evasion, fraud and making false statements — landed him in prison. President Donald Trump pardoned him in 2020.
Kerik, the 40th NYPD police commissioner, grew up in Paterson, N.J., and dropped out of Eastside High School. He then enlisted in the Army and was stationed in South Korea, according to the Associated Press, which reports that Kerik worked in private security in Saudi Arabia before coming back to the U.S., where he supervised a New Jersey jail.
His career with the NYPD began in the ’80s, and Kerik was eventually tapped to oversee the city’s troubled prison system. In 2000, Kerik was appointed police commissioner by then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani and held the position for 16 months, The New York Times reported.
Kerik was on the ground at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, and helped facilitate the building’s evacuation. His actions on 9/11 earned him praise and many formal honors, cementing him as one of the day’s heroes. Yet, his legal troubles began shortly after.
In 2004, he was nominated to lead the Department of Homeland Security by former President George W. Bush. Kerik unexpectedly withdrew his name from consideration because he employed an undocumented person in his household and his failure to pay payroll taxes, according to the Times.
His admission led to further investigations into Kerik’s dealings, which revealed that he carried on an extramarital affair in an apartment meant for rescue workers at the World Trade Center site.
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It was also revealed that he had commissioned renovations from a construction firm with alleged ties to organized crime, had committed tax fraud and had made false statements to federal investigators, according to the Times.
In 2009, Kerik pleaded guilty to eight felonies, according to CNN, including tax fraud and making false statements to federal officials. He was sentenced to four years in prison but ended up serving three for good behavior. Kerik later wrote a memoir, From Jailer to Jailed, which was published in 2015.
Trump granted Kerik a full pardon in 2020, after which Kerik became a staunch supporter of the president. Like Giuliani, Kerik denied the results of the 2020 election and said former President Joe Biden won because of fraudulent voting practices, according to the Times.
During the House Jan. 6 committee, Kerik provided documents implicating himself in other efforts to deny the election results.
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