Philip B. Banks III, New York City’s deputy mayor for public safety, has resigned, Mayor Eric Adams said on Monday morning, making him the sixth senior administration official to leave City Hall in the past month.
His departure comes amid an exceptional amount of turmoil at the highest levels of city government, as four federal investigations envelop Mr. Adams and his inner circle, and after prosecutors unsealed a five-count corruption indictment against the mayor.
On Sept. 4, federal investigators seized the phones of Mr. Banks, as part of an investigation into a possible bribery scheme.
As part of the same inquiry, investigators also seized the phones of Mr. Banks’s brother David C. Banks, the schools chancellor who will step down next week, and Sheena Wright, the first deputy mayor and the schools chancellor’s wife. Ms. Wright is expected to resign imminently.
The inquiry also involves a third brother, Terence Banks, a retired train supervisor who formed a consulting firm and represented clients with business before agencies overseen by his brothers.
In the ensuing weeks, Mr. Adams has faced significant internal and external pressure to restore faith in City Hall, including from Gov. Kathy Hochul, who has the power to remove him from office.
Last month, Lisa Zornberg, the mayor’s former chief counsel, asked him to clean house. His initial reluctance to follow her advice prompted her resignation.
Mr. Adams said Monday that Mr. Banks was leaving the administration by choice.
”He reached out to me and stated, ‘Eric, I’m looking to move on, and this is a good time to do so,’ ” Mr. Adams said during an interview on NY1.
Mr. Banks could not immediately be reached for comment. His lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, said in an email Monday morning that he would respond on his client’s behalf later in the day.
News of Mr. Banks’s resignation was first reported by the New York Post.
Mr. Banks and Mr. Adams have known each other since the 1980s, when Mr. Adams was a transit police officer who looked up to Mr. Banks’s father, a trailblazing Black officer in the Police Department.
Philip Banks began his career as a patrol officer at the 81st Precinct in Brooklyn and eventually rose to become deputy chief in 2010. He also belonged to the Grand Council of Guardians, a fraternal group of Black officers that Mr. Adams once led.
But he was an unusual choice for deputy mayor. In 2014, Mr. Banks retired abruptly as chief of department, the Police Department’s top uniformed official. Federal prosecutors later labeled him an unindicted co-conspirator in a corruption investigation during the administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio. Mr. Banks was not charged with a crime.
That wide-ranging investigation began with a Harlem restaurateur who was believed to be running an illegal liquor distribution business, and it expanded to examine Mr. de Blasio’s campaign fund-raising. Mr. de Blasio was never charged.
But the investigation did lead to the convictions or guilty pleas of Mr. Banks’s friend Norman Seabrook, who led the city’s correction officers’ union; a senior police official who worked for Mr. Banks; and two businessmen who sought to influence Mr. Banks and other city officials.
Mr. Adams’s 2021 election offered Mr. Banks a second chance.
As Mr. Adams’s deputy mayor for public safety, Mr. Banks worked to limit drivers’ use of cars with altered plates to avoid tolls and tickets, Mr. Adams said Monday. He also worked to crack down on the sale of unlicensed cannabis.
Mr. Adams on Monday described Mr. Banks as a “good friend” and wished him well. He also argued that he would have no trouble finding replacements for the many officials who have left his administration in recent weeks.
“I think we underestimate how deep not only is the bench for government, but for the city,” Mr. Adams said during another television interview, on WPIX. “We have talented people in the city.”
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