Join FRIENDS for an exciting evening as we proudly honor Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly at our Tenth Annual Ambassador to the Upper East Side Award Dinner on Monday, September 30th.

Raymond W. Kelly was appointed police commissioner of the City of New York by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg in January 2002, making
Commissioner Kelly the first person to hold the post for a second, separate tenure.

He also served as police commissioner under Mayor David Dinkins from 1992 to 1994. In 2002, under Commissioner Kelly’s leadership, the NYPD became the first municipal police department in the country to develop its own counterterrorism bureau and global intelligence program. Commissioner Kelly
also established a Real Time Crime Center, a state-of-the-art facility that uses data mining to search millions of computer records and put investigative leads into the hands of detectives in the field.

Commissioner Kelly was formerly senior managing director of global corporate security at Bear Stearns. Before that, he served as commissioner of the U.S. Customs Service, where he managed the agency’s 20,000 employees and $20 billion in annual revenue. For his accomplishments at Customs, Commissioner Kelly was awarded the Alexander Hamilton Medal for Exceptional Service.

From 1996 to 1998, Commissioner Kelly was Under Secretary for Enforcement at the U.S. Treasury Department. There he supervised the
department’s enforcement bureaus, including the U.S. Customs Service; the U.S. Secret Service; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms; and the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center.

In addition, Commissioner Kelly served on the executive committee and was elected vice president for the Americas of Interpol, the international police organization, from 1996 to 2000. He served previously as director
of the International Police Monitors in Haiti, a U.S.-led force responsible for ending human rights abuses and establishing an interim police force there. For this service, Commissioner Kelly was awarded the Exceptionally Meritorious Service Commendation by the president of the United States.

A 43-year veteran of the NYPD, Commissioner Kelly served in 25 different commands in the department before being named Police Commissioner.

A combat veteran of the Vietnam War, Commissioner Kelly retired as a colonel from the Marine Corps Reserves after 30 years of service. He holds a BBA from Manhattan College, a JD from St. John’s University School of Law, an LLM from New York University Graduate School of Law, and an MPA from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. In addition to numerous honorary degrees, Commissioner Kelly was awarded the French government’s Légion d’Honneur decoration in 2006.