In 1974, Mr. Demakos Thomas J. Shea, the first New York City police officer to be charged with murder while on duty. The officer, a white male, had shot a 10-year-old black boy, Clifford Glover, in South Jamaica, Queens, in what he said was self-defense. An all-white jury acquitted him, and the shooting and verdict sparked riots.
In 1989, as some 250 police officers cheered in court, Judge Demakos sentenced a 23-year-old drug dealer to a maximum of 25 years to life for the murder of Edward Byrne, a rookie New York City police officer, the previous year.
“This despicable act was also a deadly declaration of war on the very foundations of our society and a contamination of the cornerstone on which our criminal justice system is founded,” Judge Demakos said during the sentencing.
He was born Anastasisos Demakos, a son of Greek immigrants, on November 28, 1923, in Manhattan and grew up in the Bronx. (He was at Yankee Stadium in 1939 when Lou Gehrig gave his famous “happiest man in the world” speech.) His father, Gust C. Demakos, was a restaurant owner. His mother, Jane (Chrisomalis) Demakos, was a homemaker. He legally changed his name to Thomas in 1955.
After serving in the Marine Corps from 1943 to 1946, he earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Long Island University in 1949 and a master’s degree in business administration from New York University in 1952.
He practiced accounting for several years, but got bored and enrolled at NYU’s School of Law, graduating in 1957. He was appointed assistant prosecutor in 1962, after the Greek Orthodox Church strained its political power to appoint a Greek American to the prosecutor’s office. office. In 1975 he became chief assistant.
Judge Demakos was a member of the Criminal Court from 1980 to 1985. He was elected to the Supreme Court in 1985 and served until 1999, when he reached the mandatory retirement age of 76. He was a bailiff until 2011.