The mayor had a photo of a fallen officer. Was his story about it true?

In his first month in office, Mayor Eric Adams faced a tragic crisis: the deaths of two New York City police officers responding to a domestic disturbance in Harlem.

Mr. Adams, a former police chief who campaigned as a Democratic crime fighter, was quick to try to humanize the killings. The loss of the officers, he said, reminded him of the death of a friend, Officer Robert Venable, in 1987.

“I still think about Robert,” Mr Adams said at a press conference at City Hall. “I have a picture of Robert in my wallet.”

A week later, Mr. Adams posed for a portrait in his office, with a wallet-sized photograph of Agent Venable, after The New York Times asked to see it. Mr Adams has since repeated the touching anecdote in media interviews and at a police academy ceremony last June where he again showed Officer Venable’s photo.

But Agent Venable’s weathered photo hadn’t actually been in the mayor’s wallet for decades. It had been created by employees in the mayor’s office in the days after Mr. Adams claimed to have had it in his wallet.

The employees were instructed to take a photo of Agent Venable, according to a person familiar with the request. A photo of the agent was found on Google; it was printed in black and white and made to look worn as if the mayor had been carrying it for a while, including sprinkling some coffee on it, said the person, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation .

Two former city hall aides, who asked not to be identified, said they were made aware of the manipulated photo last year, not long after it was taken.

Fabien Levy, a spokesman for the mayor, did not dispute that Mr Adams showed a photo to The Times and at the police ceremony recently taken by a City Hall official.

However, Mr. Levy insisted that Mr. Adams had carried a photo of Officer Venable for decades, and gave the names of several former transit police colleagues who said in interviews that Mr. Adams and Officer Venable had indeed been friends.

The person who immediately ordered the altered photo taken said he had no comment when The Times reached him, according to the person familiar with the matter. She said she was instructed to direct all media inquiries to Mr. Levy.

Mr Levy criticized The Times for what he characterized as a “campaign to portray the mayor as a liar”.

“The Times’ attempts to attack the mayor here would be laughable if it weren’t so utterly insulting,” he said in a statement Wednesday.

After releasing the statement, Mr. Levy repeated requests to elaborate on the photo’s authenticity. He also did not respond to questions about whether the photo was partially aged by putting coffee on it.

As mayor, Mr. Adams regularly shares personal memories, connecting with his working class community. Many of his stories are difficult to verify, and at times he has been caught stretching the truth. For example, the mayor said he was vegan before admitting he eats fish; he said a story he told in a 2019 launch speech about harassing a neighbor was true, but acknowledged it had not happened to him.

More recently, the claims of Mr. Adams that he had sold his interest in a one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn, again contradicted by recent financial disclosure forms showing he still owns it.

But in his retelling of wearing Officer Venable’s photo, the mayor and his staff went one step further. City resources were used to create a photograph that Mr. Adams was sure had not been in his possession for decades; city ​​employees were pressured to participate.

In the first interview with The Times in his office, Mr Adams said the photo was “always in my wallet until my wallet got too bulky”, adding that he had recently kept it in a money clip.

“He was a very dear friend and it keeps me involved,” he said.

Mr. Adams brought up the photo in at least two television interviews last April when he discussed his grief over the deaths of Harlem officers Wilbert Mora and Jason Rivera.

“I understand the pain,” Mr Adams said on News 12. “I carry with me a photo of Robert Venable, my good friend, who was shot several years ago during my early days on the force, and I always have the photo of robert. The pain never goes away.”

At the June 2022 Medal Day ceremony at the Police Academy, he again held up Officer Venable’s photo, again referring to him as “one of my best friends.”

“Robert died when he was shot in the head while responding to a job,” the mayor said. “We were supposed to go away that week and go on vacation together.”

Officer Venable’s daughter, January Venable, who was 8 when her father was killed, said she had no recollection of ever meeting Mr. Adams until this year. Ms Venable, now 44, said in an early spring interview that she was surprised to learn that the mayor was carrying a photo of her father.

“All I can say is that whether it’s in his wallet or not, the fact that people still think of my dad all these years later – whatever the meaning behind it – makes me thankful that he isn’t forgotten” , she says. Venabel said.

Five police officers who knew Mr. Adams and Officer Venable in the early 1980s recalled that the men were friends. Randolph Blenman, a former police officer, said the two worked together and socialized.

“There weren’t many young black officers,” he said. “Those of us who came in after the fiscal crisis of the 1970s — we basically stayed together.”

Benjamin Andrews said he was Mr. Adams’ partner in the transit force, and that they were friends with Mr. Venable: “We worked together, we partied together.” Cliff Hollingsworth, another officer, said he remembered Mr Adams “taking Robert’s death very personally.”

January Venable said she wanted her father to be remembered for giving back to the community and setting up basketball hoops in a local Brooklyn park so kids had a place to play. The park was later named after him.

Ms Venable, who lived with her grandparents after her father’s death, said if the mayor stretches the truth about carrying the photo in his wallet, it’s possible he had good intentions “to drive home a point drive – there is too much gun violence.”

This was not the first time Mr Adams or his campaign has provided The Times with a document that casts doubt on its authenticity. During the height of the 2021 mayoral race, the campaign told The Times it would provide a contract showing that a property Mr. Adams co-owned in Brooklyn was transferred to its other owner, Sylvia Cowan, in 2007. provided the “official document transferring ownership” – a letter to Mrs. Cowan, not notarized, signed by Mr. Adams but not hers, dated February 9, 2007.

An email obtained by The Times that Ms Cowan sent to the co-op’s board in May 2021 stated that Mr Adams had agreed to transfer ownership to her – 14 years after the campaign’s letter. Mr Adams listed the apartment on his financial disclosure forms released this year, and a spokesman for the mayor said the transfer process was still “ongoing”.

Betsy Gotbaum, executive director of Citizens Union, a good government group, said she had known the mayor for years. She said she was unaware of the photo’s provenance, but did not understand why he would risk embellishing the truth around it.

“Stretching the truth in this context casts doubt on the credibility of an elected official, and that can be a problem for voters,” she said. “I don’t understand why he’s doing it. He doesn’t have to do it, so why is he doing it?”

Mr Venable’s niece, Meredith Benson, when first approached by The Times said she would be disappointed if the mayor wasn’t honest about the photo. But in a recent phone call, she said she was more concerned about Mr. Adams’ management of the city, saying, “I support him 100 percent.”

Mrs. Benson, who was a teenager when her uncle died, recalled the visits Mr. Adams made to the family after Agent Venable’s death, his kindness to her grandmother, and his taking the family to events. She said she hadn’t seen Mr. Adams for about three decades until this year.

How the mayor handled the photo, she added, “wouldn’t detract from the spirit and impact my uncle had.”

In April, Jan Venable said she finally met the mayor on a breakfast on Long Island in honor of her father and another officer who was killed in the line of duty. Mrs. Venable invited Mr. Adams and said she was glad he came. They have not discussed the photo.

“He played with my son,” she said, “and he told my son that his grandpa was a great guy.”

Susan Beachy contributed research.