Retired capt. claims bias & sues the NYPD

A retired police captain says the NYPD froze him out of promotions during the last half of his career because the department is biased against Asians.

Ahmad Alli is suing the city, former Police Commissioner Dermot Shea and current commissioner Keechant Sewell for discrimination, alleging that about six out of 10 white captains get promoted beyond the rank of captain, compared to about two of 10 Asian captains.

“Alli then languished in the rank of captain for nearly 11 years without ever being promoted above the rank of captain,” the suit, filed Friday in Brooklyn Supreme Court, alleges. “Meanwhile, his white colleagues received promotions during those same 11 years.”

“I know suing now doesn’t look good, like it’s a frivolous lawsuit,” Alli, 51, told the Daily News. “But I really thought about it and I feel the only way things are going to get better for the new guys, the new Asian captains, and for things to be fair and for them to be promoted, is if there is change and if Asians are not left behind because of the color of their skin.”

Alli (above) retired in frustration in 2020. His last post was Brooklyn South Narcotics. He said he considered filing a lawsuit while still on the force but decided against it because he feared the department would retaliate against him.

Alli’s lawyer, John Scola, is asking the case be certified as a class action in the hopes of forcing the NYPD to change its practices.

“There is a culture that prevents minorities from being promoted on the same level as white supervisors,” Scola said. “And it’s not like you file an allegation of discrimination and they do an honest good faith investigation.”

Officers pass tests to become sergeants, lieutenants and captains. Any promotions beyond that, starting with deputy inspector, is discretionary.

One Police Plaza observers and critics have noted through the years that such promotions are too often a byproduct of cronyism and that with the upper echelon of the nation’s largest police force typically comprised mostly of white men, those of other races get passed over.

But the NYPD, which refused to answer any questions about Alli’s allegations or provide demographic data that shows how long it takes captains of different races to get promoted, has pointed in recent years to greater diversification at the department’s highest levels, culminating with the naming of Police Commissioner, Keechant Sewell, a Black woman.

There are nearly 37,000 cops, 10% of which are Asian, according to NYPD statistics. There are 50 Asian captains and eight deputy inspectors, three inspectors and one deputy chief. By comparison, whites comprise 44% of the force, with 200 captains, 110 deputy inspectors, 88 inspectors, 52 deputy chiefs and 10 chiefs.

Alli, who identifies as Asian, was born in Guyana and is three-quarters Indian and one-quarter Chinese. He joined the NYPD in 1995, loved being a cop and was able to rise through the ranks.

He was promoted to sergeant in 2000, lieutenant in 2003 and captain in 2009. But that last promotion, he told The News, was delayed two years because of administrative charges accusing him of interfering with a supervisor trying to discipline another officer.

He was cleared of any wrongdoing, but he said that when he was finally promoted he was sent to a Bronx transit command far from his Queens home — a form of “highway therapy,” as police call it, giving someone out of favor a long commute to work.

Alli said he suspected even before he first pushed to get promoted to the next rank, deputy inspector, that the fix was in, with colleagues telling him he had hit the “glass ceiling.”

They weren’t wrong, he said, though no one ever explained why he wasn’t promoted again.

“They never tell you anything because there’s no justification for it,” he said. “It became embarrassing that the guys that were my sergeants and worked for me were getting promoted and were now my bosses.”