New Report: The Problem of “Wandering Cops” in an Era of Police Shortages

NEW YORK, NY — Amidst a rise in serious violent crime, police departments across the country are struggling to recruit and retain high-quality officers. But even despite shortages, departments should be wary of hiring “wandering cops,” a term referring to officers who leave one police department after alleged misconduct and are then hired by another agency. In a new report for the Manhattan Institute, adjunct fellow Dorothy Moses Schulz discusses the causes of wandering cops and offers several policy recommendations to address the problem and related concerns. After all, though the number of wanderers is minimal compared to the almost 700,000 police officers in the nation, they pose a real threat to the public and to the reputation of law enforcement. 

On the surface, wandering cops appear to be advantageous hires, allowing departments to fill roles left by record numbers of resignations and retirements without having to spend money to train new talent. But wanderers tend to bring their disciplinary issues with them, which may explain why they are typically rehired by smaller departments in their states with lower pay and higher crime rates. To that end, Schulz argues that new laws and better recordkeeping on decertifying rogue officers will deter agencies from giving them second, third, or fourth chances. Her recommendations include: 

• Making decertification easier to achieve by states’ police officer standards training (POST) bureaus. 

• Expanding participation in the National Decertification Index (NDI). 

• Launching more state-based decertification indexes. 

• Ensuring that state indexes report other contextualizing information (beyond certification status) that will allow departments to make better decisions when considering certified officers who left previous employers under a disciplinary cloud. 

• Including decertification index inquiries in police background-check processes. 

• Requiring POSTs to report on both “delisting” and decertification. 

In June, President Joe Biden unexpectedly announced that $350 billion of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds could be used to hire police officers. Schulz suggests states use this money to support POSTs’ needs for additional personnel and technological expertise so that information shared with NDI is timely and accurate. For any remaining resources, Schulz argues the federal government should act to subsidize police recruit training, with priority given to those departments with the greatest need. Eliminating—or easing—their financial burdens will allow police departments to hire the best candidates for the job, rather than resorting to the cheapest candidates. 

Click here to view the full report.