John Miller (police official)
John Miller (born 1958 or 1959)[1] is the Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence & Counterterrorism of the NYPD. He is the former Associate Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Analytic Transformation and Technology.[2] Prior to that, he was an Assistant Director of Public Affairs for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), where he was the bureau's national spokesman. Miller is also a former ABC News reporter and anchorman, perhaps best known for conducting a May 1998 interview with Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan.[3][4]
John Miller | |
---|---|
![]() John Miller in 2019 | |
Born | 1958/1959 (age 61–62)[1] |
Occupation | Deputy Commissioner New York Police Department |
Spouse(s) | Emily Helen Altschul (m. 2002) |
Relatives | Arthur Goodhart Altschul Sr. (father in law) Siri von Reis (mother in law) Serena Altschul (sister in law) Frank Altschul (grandfather in law) |
Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence & Counter-terrorism, New York City Police Department | |
Assumed office January 1, 2014 | |
Preceded by | David Cohen |
John Miller was named a senior correspondent for CBS News on October 17, 2011. In this capacity, Miller reported for all CBS News platforms and broadcasts, including CBS This Morning and occasionally for 60 Minutes.[5]
Background and personal life
Miller is the son of Lucinda and John J. Miller, a syndicated columnist and freelance writer[6] whose range of roles included Hollywood gossip columnist, foreign correspondent, Broadway critic, crime investigator, and political pundit, "My dad wrote seven columns under six different names... Antonio from Rome. Pierre from Paris. Nigel from London," Miller has said. His father was also a close friend of Luciano crime family boss Frank Costello, whose wife, Lauretta, was Miller's godmother.[7]
Raised in Montclair, New Jersey, Miller attended Montclair High School, where he developed his interest in news and reporting by taking photos for sale to newspapers and ditching school in order to go to press briefings.[8][9]
In 2002, Miller married Emily Altschul, daughter of banker and Goldman Sachs Group partner Arthur Goodhart Altschul Sr.[6] and member of the Lehman family and daughter of botanist Siri von Reis. Miller's brother-in-law, Arthur Altschul, Jr., worked for Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley before becoming chairman of Medicis Pharmaceuticals Corporation.[10] His sister-in-law is former MTV VJ, Serena Altschul.
Career
Miller began work as a journalist in 1983 for WNEW, a local New York City television station. From 1985 to 1994, he worked as an investigative journalist for WNBC, another local New York television station. During his tenure at the station, he conducted several interviews with John Gotti.[11]
From 1994 to 1995, he served as deputy police commissioner of New York City, where he was the chief spokesman for the NYPD,[12] a move that some of his colleagues considered "going over to the dark side." He was hired at the request of then Commissioner William Bratton.[7]
Miller worked as an ABC News correspondent beginning in 1995. Using an al-Qaeda agent in London as an intermediary, Miller was able to make contact with Mohammed Atef to request an interview with Osama bin Laden in May 1998. Miller was instructed to travel to Islamabad, Pakistan, and was escorted over the Afghanistan-Pakistan border to meet bin Laden in a camp near Kandahar. He asked bin Laden questions that were translated into Arabic by an al-Qaeda translator, but bin Laden's answers were not translated, so Miller was not immediately aware of what bin Laden was saying during the interview.[13][14]
During his tenure at ABC, Miller also covered the September 11, 2001 attacks, where he sat alongside Peter Jennings for the duration of the day listening in to radio conversations from the FBI, FDNY and NYPD, informing Jennings and viewers of their content.[15]
In January 2002, Miller took the post of co-anchor with Barbara Walters of the ABC News program, 20/20.
In January 2003, he left ABC News to rejoin Bratton, who by then was at the Los Angeles Police Department. Miller served as the police department's Bureau Chief for the Counter-Terrorism and Criminal Intelligence Bureau,[12] which included the Major Crimes Division, and the Emergency Services Division and the Special Investigations Section (SIS). While there, Miller launched Project Archangel which included the Automated Critical Asset Management System (ACAMS),[16] among other platforms, and which has been adopted by other cities and states for ongoing risk-assessment of potential terrorist targets. Miller was also one of the original designers of the Los Angeles Joint Regional Intelligence Center (JRIC), which combines intelligence and analysis for the LAPD, LA Sheriff, and the FBI.
In September 2005, Miller became the Assistant Director for Public Affairs at the FBI in Washington, D.C. In this position, he was tasked with overseeing the FBI's internal and external communications, including relations with the news media and handling of fugitive publicity, community relations, and other communications support.[12] Miller also established an Employee Communications Unit to build stronger internal communications to the bureau's 31,000 employees. Among his collateral duties was to serve on the Strategic Execution Team (SET) to establish performance measurement standards for intelligence operations across the FBI's 56 field offices. The system, adapted from the CompStat process used by major police departments, was overseen by then-FBI Director Robert Mueller.
In 2011, Miller left his position at the FBI to work as a senior correspondent for CBS News.[17] In 2013, he reported in the "Inside the NSA" episode of 60 Minutes which was criticized for justifying the organization's spying on American citizens.[18][19]
In December 2013, Miller announced that he would be resigning from CBS in order to take a position as the Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence & Counterterrorism with the NYPD. Miller rejoined William Bratton, who had earlier been announced as the new NYPD Commissioner by Mayor Bill de Blasio.[20][21]
Awards and honors
Miller's journalistic awards include two Peabody Awards,[22][23] a DuPont-Columbia Award,[24] and nine Emmys.[25]
Memberships and affiliations
He is a member of the International Association of Bomb Technicians and Investigators and the International Association of Chiefs of Police.
Miller is an instructor at the FBI's National Executive Institute, as well as the Leadership in Counterterrorism (LinCT) course and has attended training in organizational change at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government as well as the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
See also
References
- "Bratton: CBS News correspondent John Miller to be NYPD's counter-terrorism chief". Daily News. New York. January 3, 2014.
The 55-year-old from New Jersey has held top jobs in the NYPD, FBI, and ran counter-terror efforts for the LAPD under Police Commissioner Bill Bratton
- Chief FBI Spokesman John Miller Stepping Down, Ticklethewire.com, August 18, 2009
- "Who Is Bin Laden?", PBS Frontline, May 1998.
- "1998 – Osama Bin Laden Interview with ABC John Miller", YouTube.
- John Miller, biography on CBS.com.
- WEDDINGS/CELEBRATIONS; Emily Altschul, John Miller, The New York Times, November 24, 2002.
- John Miller: CBS's Inside Man, Men's Journal, March 2013.
- Kiesewetter, John. "Miller is reluctant co-anchor on '20-20'", The Cincinnati Enquirer, January 6, 2002. Accessed March 22, 2018. "As a ninth-grader in Montclair, N.J., in 1973, he would listen to the police scanner and ride his bike to crime stories. He'd take photographs and sell them to New York newspapers."
- Staff. "Former Montclair resident John Miller to be special guest at 200 Club", The Record (Bergen County), April 28, 2016. Accessed March 22, 2018. "Miller, a former broadcast journalist, got his journalistic start as a student in Montclair High School, when he would cut class to attend press briefings in Newark, according to Essex County Sheriff’s Office representative Kevin Lynch."
- Profile of Arthur Altschul, Forbes
- Barmash, Jerry (October 27, 2011). "One-Time WNBC Reporter John Miller Headed for CBS' Early Show". AdWeek.
- John Miller Named Assistant Director of FBI Office of Public Affairs, FBI National Press Office, August 23, 2005.
- Bharara, Preet (October 5, 2017). "Guns, Gotti & bin Laden". WYNC Studios.
- Bergen, Peter (2006). The Osama Bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of Al Qaeda's Leader. Simon and Schuster. pp. 210–18. ISBN 0743278925.
- Allison Gilbert; Phil Hirschkorn; Melinda Murphy; Robyn Walensky (2002). Covering Catastrophe: Broadcast Journalists Report September 11. Bonus Books. p. 204. ISBN 9781566251808.
- "Operation Archangel – Los Angeles Police Department". www.lapdonline.org.
- Shaw, Lucas (October 17, 2011). "Veteran newsman John Miller joins CBS News". Reuters.
- Ackerman, Spencer (December 16, 2013). "NSA goes on 60 Minutes: the definitive facts behind CBS's flawed report". Guardian.
- Carr, David (December 22, 2013). "When '60 Minutes' Checks Its Journalistic Skepticism at the Door". New York Times.
- "CBS News' John Miller rejoining NYPD". CBS News.
- Littleton, Cynthia (December 26, 2013). "CBS News Correspondent John Miller Rejoins NYPD". Variety.
- "The Peabody Awards". peabodyawards.com. Retrieved June 11, 2020.
- "The Peabody Awards". peabodyawards.com. Retrieved June 11, 2020.
- "Archived copy". Archived from the original on December 28, 2013. Retrieved December 28, 2013.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) 2014 Winners
- "John Miller Exiting CBS News to Return to NYPD". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved June 11, 2020.