Top cop James O’Neill and other NYPD brass flew to a wake for a colleague’s mom in the same federally funded $4 million spy plane that shuttled Mayor de Blasio to and from the city during his Canada vacation, The Post has learned.
Chief of Department Terence Monahan — then the NYPD’s chief of patrol — was also aboard the Cessna C208 Caravan en route to Allentown, Pa., on June 6, 2017, sources said.
The revelation comes amid a federal probe of the NYPD’s use of the plane — sparked by a Post report on de Blasio’s flight from Montreal to attend a memorial for slain NYPD Detective Miosotis Familia in The Bronx on July 5.
The 2017 flight carried the NYPD contingent to a wake for then-Chief of Detectives Robert Boyce’s mother, Dolores, sources said.
A department spokesman confirmed O’Neill was on the plane.
Dolores Boyce died June 1, 2017, and a service was held June 6, 2017, at O’Donnell Funeral Home in the Allentown suburb of North Catasauqua, according to an obituary.
The NYPD spy plane landed at Lehigh Valley Airport — a 13-minute drive from the funeral home — at 4:58 p.m. on the day of the wake, and spent 65 minutes there before returning to the tri-state area, according to flight-tracking service FlightAware.
It’s the only trip the plane has made to the Allentown area, according to three years of data compiled by the Web site.
The trip to Pennsylvania took about 30 minutes each way, but the plane was in use for 8¹/₂ hours, records show.
It took off from Long Island’s MacArthur Airport at 12:03 p.m. and landed at Teterboro Airport just before 1 p.m. It stayed there until departing for Pennsylvania at 4:21 p.m., records show.
By the time the Cessna made it back to Long Island at the end of the run, it was 8:25 p.m.
NYPD pilots were used for the flights, sources said.
It would have been a two-hour drive from 1 Police Plaza to the North Catasauqua funeral home.
The plane and its high-tech gear were funded through a $6.8 million Urban Areas Security Initiative grant from FEMA’s Homeland Security Grant Program.
Sources said the plane is supposed to travel the coast searching for terrorists trying to smuggle radioactive weapons into the US.
Landlocked North Catasauqua is more than 70 miles from the New York Harbor.
But a department spokesman claimed the flight to Pennsylvania was above board.
“Based on our knowledge and a thorough review of the FEMA guidelines, the NYPD has acted with 100 percent compliance to rules regarding appropriate use,” NYPD spokesman Phil Walzak said Monday.
“These assets are authorized for multiple capabilities and multiple functionalities,” he added, without providing a copy of the FEMA guidelines.
Following a Post exposé, US Rep. Dan Donovan (R–SI) sent a letter to FEMA demanding an investigation.
FEMA confirmed it is probing the July 5 flight, but did not immediately comment on the Pennsylvania trip.
