Born Seán Francis Timoney on July 2, 1948, in Dublin, Ireland, he was brought up on Winetavern Street in The Liberties area of the city.

[2] In 1967, a month after Timoney's high school graduation, his mother and sister Marie returned to Ireland, but the two brothers remained, sharing an apartment and both working to support themselves.

Since he was not yet 21, Timoney spent his first 18 months at NYPD assigned to clerical duties in the 17th Precinct before he started a six-month training program at the police academy, in February 1969.

He was finally sworn in as a full-fledged police officer in July 1969 and was assigned to the 44th Precinct in the same Bronx neighborhood as his high school.

He worked on a relatively entrepreneurial basis to penetrate complex drug organizations, assemble cases, and coordinate operations with various patrol precincts, detective squads, and specialized units.

That atmosphere, combined with his relatively brief tenure on the force, lack of veteran's preference points, and middling scores, delayed his promotion until 1980.

[6] In 1981, Timoney was awarded an NYPD scholarship to pursue a second master's degree (with a paid one-year leave of absence) in urban planning at Hunter College.

In his 2010 biography, Timoney describes this as a turning point in his career, bringing him into contact with several influential academics (including Donna Shalala) and the entire field of public policy.

There, he handled several high-profile issues, including a focus on cleaning up quality-of-life crimes in Bryant Park and overseeing security for the 40th anniversary United Nations General Assembly.

[11] Although the ACLU protested these perceived abuses, ultimately filing seven lawsuits, its executive director praised Timoney as "probably one of the most professional, competent and experienced police chiefs the city of Miami ever had".

[14] Immediately upon the swearing in of Mayor Tomas Regalado in November 2009, Timoney dispatched his resignation letter, effective January 2010.

The appointment came during the pro-democracy Bahraini uprising, leading to speculation from The New York Times that he had been hired to teach his "Miami model" of protest dispersal, involving "heavy use of concussion grenades, pepper spray, tear gas, rubber bullets and baton charges.

However, the story also noted his supporters' argument that his "record for turning failing police departments around" made him ideal to control the perceived excesses of Bahraini security forces.

[17] Another Guardian journalist, Matthew Cassel, reported that he himself had been tear-gassed, shot with rubber bullets, and chased by police who sought to confiscate his equipment while covering the Miami protests; he argued that Timoney's hiring demonstrated that the ruling Al Khalifa family was "more concerned with maintaining absolute power as they continue to lose further legitimacy, rather than implementing any real reforms to move past the country's political crisis.

She was once a director of finance and administration at ABC in New York, but when her husband's career blossomed, she became an independent business consultant to devote more time to managing home and family.