Mayor de Blasio (right) still hasn't reviewed video that shows his top administrative judge, Fidel Del Valle (left), unleashing a profane tirade on a City Hall police officer last month. (Susan Watts / New York Daily News)
Mayor de Blasio still has not reviewed video that shows his top administrative judge, Fidel Del Valle, unleashing a profane tirade on a City Hall police officer last month — but he’s been given the gist of it.
“I have not — I’ve gotten an assessment of the video both from the police commissioner and the first deputy mayor. I do intend to see it,” de Blasio said Wednesday at an unrelated news conference in Brooklyn.
Del Valle, the commissioner of the Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings, became unhinged when a veteran City Hall cop asked him the reason for his visit as he arrived for an event Nov. 13.
“Listen, Babe, I don’t give a f--k! Do you know who I am?” the hotheaded Del Valle erupted at the female officer, according to a letter by the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association. “Who the f--k do you think you are?”
The megalomaniacal meltdown was caught by another officer’s body-worn camera. While de Blasio hasn’t yet seen the footage of the incident, which happened a month ago, Police Commissioner James O’Neill said he’d reviewed it and found the officers had been professional — and Del Valle’s behavior had been “particularly egregious.”
“This is a situation that, you know, troubles me and worries me, because we need to show respect,” de Blasio said. “It doesn’t matter what your title is, you have to show respect for police officers and you have to go through whatever security protocols they indicate.”
While he’d only gotten the Cliffs Notes version of the video, de Blasio said that based on what he’d heard about it, “it’s not acceptable to treat a police officer that way, period.” “No one deserves to be treated that way, particularly someone who protects us as a member of the NYPD,” he said.
The PBA has called for Del Valle’s head, but de Blasio said he couldn’t comment further pending an investigation.
“The situation is under review, an investigation right this minute, we will have a response next week,” de Blasio said. “I have spoken to the police commissioner, I am going to be speaking to him again about it.”
He has not yet spoken with Del Valle — who also once rained vulgar vitriol on a room of Albany lawmakers — but said he would. “We will have a final update on this next week,” he said.
PBA President Patrick Lynch said Wednesday that Del Valle had acted “irrationally” and was “out of control” during the gate interaction.
“No commissioner should speak to a New York City police officer or any citizen in that tone,” Lynch said.
Despite his history of outbursts, Del Valle remains the head of an office that conducts disciplinary trials for other city workers accused of misconduct.
“He should not sit in judgment of any city employee if his temperament is to bully and abuse and curse at a police officer who is just asking for him to identify himself, which is routine going into City Hall,” Lynch said. “If you don't recognize, you ask them to ID themselves. He refused, and abused those police officers."