Who

Scoppetta is New York City's fire commissioner. He's responsible for more than 16,000 firefighters, emergency medical personnel and civilians on staff at the FDNY.

Background

The son of Italian immigrants living on the Lower East Side, Scoppetta was abandoned at the age of five and placed in a children's shelter; he ended up living in foster homes for much of his childhood. Scoppetta served in the Korean War, then attended Bradley University on the G.I. Bill. After graduating from Brooklyn Law in 1962, he worked as an assistant district attorney before going into private practice. (His most famous case: defending socialite Sydney Biddle Barrows, better known as the "Mayflower Madam," who in 1985 pled guilty to running a prostitution ring.) He returned to public service in 1996 as the head of the Administration for Children's Services, a job he once described as an excellent "emotional fit" for him given his childhood in and out of foster homes. In 2002, Mayor Bloomberg called on Scoppetta to rebuild the New York City Fire Department, which was still reeling from Sept. 11th; the appointment came as a shock to the highly insular FDNY, as Scoppetta was an outsider who had had zero experience with firefighting or department administration.

On the job

When Scoppetta took command of the FDNY, the department was struggling to rebuild itself after the World Trade Center attacks, which took the lives of 343 firefighters. His tenure hasn't been an easy one. Bloomberg's 2003 decision to close six firehouses may have made fiscal sense, but it was sharply criticized by firefighter advocates like Stephen Cassidy, and perceived by many to be an insensitive move in light of the raw emotions within the department.

Scoppetta has also taken heat for bad behavior on the part of firefighters over the past few years. A brawl at a Staten Island firehouse left a firefighter in critical condition and there were allegations that superior officers tried to cover up the incident; firefighters have been spotted drinking on the job (after what they went through on Sept. 11th, who can blame 'em?); two firefighters deliberately set a fire in front of the Engine Company 34 firehouse; and several others in the Bronx were accused of having sex with a woman at a firehouse. The biggest challenge Scoppetta has faced recently was the fallout from the August 2007 death of two firefighters at the Deutsche Bank building: A subsequent investigation revealed that other firefighters' negligence led to the two men getting trapped in the burning building.

Keeping score

He made $181,719 as commissioner in 2007.

On the side

While serving as head of the ACS, Scoppetta started New Yorkers for Children, a non-profit organization that cares for at-risk children and those in foster care. Board members include Oscar de la Renta, Beth Rudin DeWoody, Anna Wintour, Isabella Rossellini, Geoffrey Canada, Debbie Bancroft, and Dayssi Olarte de Kanavos.

Personal

Scoppetta and his wife Susan live on the Upper East Side. The couple has two children: Eric, a Dalton/Cornell/Fordham Law graduate who recently abandoned law to pursue a teaching career; and Andrea, a child social worker.

No joke

The Sidney Lumet-directed 1981 movie, Prince of the City, is based on an investigation Scoppetta conducted when he was an ADA.