NYPD Commissioner Edward Caban Monday took over as the 46th head of the nation’s largest police force.
With passersby looking on, many chanting “Eddie! Eddie!” and waving Puerto Rican flags, a nod to Caban’s heritage, the top cop was sworn in by Mayor Adams outside the Bronx’s 40th Precinct stationhouse in Mott Haven, his first assignment when he joined the NYPD in 1991.
Caban, who was born in the Bronx and attended Cardinal Hayes High School, is the NYPD’s first Latino commissioner.
He noted in his speech Monday that the first time he stepped into the stationhouse he realized none of the photos hanging on the wall of dozens of previous precinct commanders looked like him.
But he had a good mentor, he noted. His father, Juan Caban, was a first-grade Transit Police detective and the head of that department’s Hispanic Society, advocating for other Latino cops.
Caban succeeds another history maker, Keechant Sewell, the first woman to run the NYPD.
Sewell took over in January 2022 and served 18 months, resigning, according to multiple police sources, over the micromanaging by the City Hall tandem of Adams, a retired NYPD captain, and Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Philip Banks, a one-time NYPD Chief of Department.
Sewell, who previously served as Chief of Detectives for the Nassau County Police Department, had to work her way through the political minefields of One Police Plaza and City Hall.
Caban, 54, has been interim NYPD commissioner since July 1 He has known Adams for years and spent more than a decade at NYPD Brooklyn North headquarters before he was tapped by Adams to be the NYPD First Deputy Commissioner under Sewell.
Caban, who is married with two children, faces immense challenges, most notably how to bring crime back down to the record low levels achieved before it spiked during the COVID pandemic.
Murders and shootings dropped last year even as the overall major crime rate surged 22% compared to the year before. The news is better this year, with murders and shootings continuing to drop and the crime rate up less than 1% so far this year compared to by this time last year.
But morale is still an issue for many officers following the “Defund the Police” movement and legislation many officers see as making it more difficult to do their jobs.
As First Deputy, Caban’s responsibilities included supervision of the discipline system for cops accused of misconduct.
