Ramapo child struck, injured in third crash involving school bus this year

Suspended Mount Vernon cop who was secretly recorded has applied for disability retirement

Jonathan Bandler
Rockland/Westchester Journal News

A Mount Vernon police officer who was recorded by a colleague acknowledging misconduct by himself and other members of the narcotics unit filed for disability retirement this summer.

John Campo, who was suspended without pay last week, several months after the recordings surfaced, applied to the state Comptroller’s Office for the disability pension in early September.

Campo could only get a full pension if the disability is approved because he has only worked for half of the 20 years required for no pension reductions.

Campo’s suspension took effect last Monday. He had been required to answer questions related to the department's internal investigation into the recordings and faced suspension if he was not fully forthcoming. 

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Campo could not be reached and a lawyer representing him declined to comment. His lawyer on the disability retirement, Warren Roth, said Campo has suffered from debilitating back injuries for years as well as a stressful work environment since the tapes came to light.

"All he ever wanted to be was a cop," said Roth, who also represented Campo's father, a master plumber who died from cancer he contracted after he was exposed to toxins when he worked at Ground Zero at the time of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Campo is a key figure in the secret recordings made by Officer Murashea Bovell beginning in 2017. Bovell has complained about police misconduct, and retaliation against him for revealing it, in a pair of lawsuits in recent years.

What's allegedly on the tapes

Bovell and his lawyer shared the tapes with The Gothamist this year. In one, Campo acknowledges holding 40 rocks of crack cocaine for a man who was arrested on minor charges because he was an informant of the narcotics unit and they did not want it known he had the drugs. When the man was released from headquarters, Campo said he gave him his drugs back.

In another recording, he talks of the narcotics unit allowing a known drug dealer to operate with impunity, including one instance where they knew he had a gun in his car while driving with his son.

Campo complained on the tapes about being booted from the unit for testing positive for marijuana when the other narcotics officers had done far worse.

Police Commissioner Glenn Scott disbanded the narcotics unit earlier this year after the tapes surfaced and in recent months put Detective Camilo Antonini on desk duty. Antonini was accused on the tapes and in Bovell’s lawsuits of several instances of using excessive force, framing innocent people and planting evidence.

Campo’s career arc is unusual, with three separate transfers in the first four years he was a police officer.

He joined the Mount Vernon Police Department in January 2010 and completed training in the Westchester Police Academy. He left to become a Mount Kisco police officer in January 2012, but stayed only six months before transferring to the Harrison Police Department. 

Eight months after that, in March 2013, Campo was back in Mount Vernon.

While in Harrison, he injured his lower back while on duty when he kicked a door open, according to court documents. He underwent physical therapy and returned to full duty a month before leaving the department.

In Mount Vernon, Campo served three months of military duty from November 2013 to January 2014. Soon after he returned, he claimed an injury after pulling someone from a house fire. He then injured his knee during a car chase.

Campo then sought disability pay for an injury he suffered in August 2014 when he claimed to have tripped over a chair in the cell block area where he was working. His request was denied by a supervisor, then by top police officials following a hearing. A state appellate court in 2017 upheld the city’s determination.

He returned to work and did not appeal the ruling further. There remains a $515 judgement against Campo in state Supreme Court for court costs.

Twitter: @jonbandler