The years following George Floyd’s in-custody death in 2020 have been bloody ones for the people of Minneapolis—particularly those living in low-income communities that were already experiencing the bulk of the city’s violent crime long before 2020.[1] The Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) has struggled to recover from a mass exodus of officers in the wake of Floyd’s death and the public outcry that followed. Staffing levels in 2025 are nearly 350 officers shy of where they were in 2020.[2] The public’s lack of trust in the MPD was exhibited by a public referendum in 2021 proposing to dismantle the department, which was narrowly rejected by only 56% of voters.[3] And a damning Department of Justice (DOJ) report released in June of 2023 was in no way disputed by the now second-term mayor Jacob Frey, who publicly stated that the report’s findings “are aligned with what communities of color have been telling us now for many years—in fact generations. Since May of 2020, we’ve been facing this reality on a daily basis.”[4]

Mayor Frey’s response in absolute agreement with the DOJ’s findings of organizational failure in 2023 is telling. Long before the in-custody death of George Floyd on May 25 of 2020, nearly 5 years ago, the signs of leadership failures in hiring, training, supervision, and discipline were evident—even from the outside looking in, let alone from the vantage point of the mayor’s office.

It would be tragic if law enforcement leaders across the country were not willing and able to learn from what happened 5 years ago in Minneapolis, how it happened, and why. Years of past leadership failures in the MPD were as apparent as they were avoidable. Other law enforcement agencies can and should learn from these mistakes.

Applicants and new hires who showed early “red flags” in their backgrounds or poor on-the-job conduct were nonetheless allowed to pass their probationary periods and become permanent employees. Cops who engaged in blatant misconduct were sometimes fired but later reinstated due to internal affairs failures.[5] The process of choosing field training officers (FTOs) often put many of the same problem officers who engaged in misconduct in charge of training the MPD’s newest recruits. And policy violations continued year after year, without effective course correction or termination.

So, if police leaders and elected officials in Minneapolis were not focused on these fundamentals of police operations, what, exactly, were they focused on instead?

 

If Everything is a Priority, Then Nothing is a Priority

In the years leading up to George Floyd’s death, the MPD failed to demonstrate a commitment to training and practices in the fundamentals of police operations. Instead, the MPD leadership, and the elected leaders in the City of Minneapolis, focused on an assortment of policy and training priorities that seemed to capture the cultural moment and draw praise from outside groups—many of the same outside groups that would soon call for the dismantling of the MPD altogether. Many of these policy and training priorities had questionable utility for good policing and seem to have been pursued at the expense of the types of training and policies that every law enforcement agency needs.

The MPD was an early adopter of mandatory implicit bias training in 2014. MPD supervisors completed the training first, followed closely by patrol officers in 2015, and implicit bias training became a part of academy training and “refresher” trainings in 2015.[6] For many years, racial and gender diversity in recruiting and hiring was consistently touted as a top priority for MPD leadership, in an effort to make the ranks of the MPD reflect the racial and gender diversity of the city.[7]

In 2016, the MPD created a new transgender and gender non-conformity policy, requiring officers to address LGBTQIA+ individuals using their preferred pronouns.[8] This policy was touted by the MPD’s first female and first openly gay police chief, who had served as chief since 2012.[9] By 2019, the MPD created a six-member unit comprised of “civilian community navigator positions” including one dedicated to the LGBTQIA+ community.[10]

The MPD announced a broad rollout of body-worn cameras in 2016, and then-Chief Janee Harteau announced that “the officers are absolutely using their cameras.”[11] This rollout was accompanied by an agency-wide policy identifying the multitude of situations in which cameras were mandated to be activated, along with a warning that officers who failed to comply with the policy would “be subject to discipline, up to and including termination.”[12]

And in the months just prior to George Floyd’s death, the MPD mandated training in “dog de-escalation” techniques for all officers in the wake of incidents involving MPD officers shooting aggressive dogs.[13]

This article is not intended as a blanket condemnation of these training topics, policies, and initiatives. Each one deserves its own discussion for every law enforcement agency. But priorities matter, and the failure to prioritize sound hiring, training, supervision, and discipline by MPD leaders and elected city officials, while prioritizing nearly every new wave of training and policy alternatives, is possibly the organizational and leadership failure to be examined 5 years after the death of George Floyd.

 

Getting Back to Basics

It is dangerously easy to fall into the trap of chasing all the latest headline-grabbing training topics, while allowing the back-to-basics training to suffer, as the Minneapolis case painfully illustrates. This is particularly true when a very vocal few seem to drown out the many—with the latter group being much more concerned with commonsense quality-of-life issues than anything else.

In the early months of 2020, the MPD was publicly struggling to finally address a critical area of mismanagement which had been present for years—officer exhaustion in a management system where hours worked were simply not tracked. While publicly denying that there was any connection between officer fatigue and the poor decisions made  by MPD officers in recent years, the city had recently settled for $20 Million in a deadly shooting case involving Officer Mohamed Noor, who had worked an off-duty shift for his secondary employer before reporting for work that day for the MPD.[14] When discussing the department’s failure to account for hours worked in relation to agency policies limiting off-duty hours, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey concluded, “If we can’t track hours worked, that’s not good.”[15]

This $20 Million settlement stemmed from the deadly MPD shooting of Justine Damond on July 15, 2017.[16] Damond called 911 to report what she believed to be a sexual assault in progress nearby. A two-man squad car responded to her call and approached her residence from the rear alley. Damond, the complainant witness, a middle-aged woman dressed in pajamas, approached the driver’s side door to speak with the officers when she was inexplicably shot and killed by the officer in the passenger seat—Officer Mohammed Noor.[17] The deadly shooting of the unarmed complainant resulted in a $20 million civil settlement and a five-year prison term for Noor.[18] A relatively recent hire by the MPD, Noor’s field training officers had documented critical performance issues exhibited by Noor, but somehow that did not prevent him from completing his probationary term and becoming a full-fledged member of the MPD.[19] Then-Mayor Betsy Hodges publicly praised the newly hired Noor in 2016, stating that:

Officer Noor has been assigned to the 5th Precinct, where his arrival has been highly celebrated, particularly by the Somali community in and around Karmel Mall.[20]

In the years preceding George Floyd’s death, the leadership in the MPD demonstrated basic deficiencies in internal affairs operations, first-line supervision, and other fundamentals of personnel management in a law enforcement agency. Instead of focusing on correcting these deficiencies, in the immediate aftermath of George Floyd’s death, leadership in the MPD and the City of Minneapolis publicly blamed arbitrators, who, they claimed, prevented bad cops from being fired without later being reinstated.[21]

By the end of 2020, the MPD’s own failures in conducting internal affairs investigations were becoming clear to anyone examining the cases of arbitrators overturning MPD’s disciplinary decisions. These internal affairs failures were so significant that, on December 29 of 2020, Mayor Frey and then-Chief Medaria Arradondo, who had previously led the Internal Affairs Unit, announced major changes. Frey publicly acknowledged that the MPD’s accountability failures were of their own making. He announced that their Internal Affairs Unit investigators would begin working closely with city attorneys to ensure that internal investigations were conducted thoroughly and lawfully in order to minimize the risk of legitimate discipline being overturned at arbitration. This decision came following years of internal failures to impose discipline in a fair, consistent, and timely manner, which led to many cases of police misconduct going unpunished.[22]

Frey publicly lamented the state of internal affairs operations and the resulting reinstatements of officers who had engaged in misconduct, but who were ultimately reinstated due to MPD failures in conducting fair, timely, and lawful administrative investigations. Frey stated at the time, “We, as a city, cannot allow a file languishing on an overworked investigator’s desk to boost the odds of a bad cop being put back on the street.”[23]

To summarize, in the years leading up to the death of George Floyd, MPD priorities included implicit bias training, policies on the use of gender pronouns in the field, diversifying the ranks, and dog de-escalation tactics. MPD priorities did not include effectively addressing officer fatigue, properly vetting new hires in field training for their ability to safely do the job, or competently conducting internal affairs investigations into allegations of serious police misconduct.

 

It’s Not What You Preach, It’s What You Tolerate

In March of 2020, if one had judged a police department by the sweeping statements made at press conferences, one would have been tempted to view the MPD as one of the most progressive, forward-thinking departments in the country. But, in between press conferences, accountability was undoubtedly lacking.

As mentioned previously, the MPD announced a broad rollout of body-worn cameras in 2016, at which time then-Chief Janee Harteau announced that “the officers are absolutely using their cameras.”[24] But when Justine Damond was inexplicably shot and killed by MPD Officer Noor in 2017, neither he nor his partner had activated their body-worn cameras. When other officers arrived on the scene and found out what had happened, they selectively turned their cameras off at various times during the investigation.[25] In 2019, it was announced that officers’ compliance with the body-worn camera policy was improving, although 70 officers still required mandatory training to address non-compliance. Mayor Frey indicated that, moving forward, discipline could result from non-compliance. Approximately 3 years after the public proclamation by the MPD police chief that the cameras were on and rolling, the Minneapolis mayor had to publicly acknowledge that, far too often, the body-worn cameras were not being used as had been promised.

In spite of the implicit bias training sessions and public proclamations on diversity, the death of George Floyd must ultimately be viewed as a failure of fundamental police ethics. For all the focus within the MPD leadership on racial disparities, racial discrimination, and racial bias, it must be noted that George Floyd was not determined to be the victim of a hate crime. Minnesota’s Attorney General, who was intimately involved in the criminal prosecution of Derek Chauvin, indicated in an interview with 60 Minutes in 2021, that Officer Chauvin was not charged with a hate crime due to lack of evidence.[26]

When asked by the interviewer if the in-custody death of George Floyd was a hate crime, Attorney General Ellison responded:

We don’t have evidence that Derek Chauvin factored in George Floyd’s race as he did what he did….In order for us to stop and pay serious attention to this case and be outraged by it, it’s not necessary that Derek Chauvin had a specific racial intent to harm George Floyd.[27]

This fact, possibly more than any other, should inform the way that police leaders look at training and policy priorities in 2025. It is a fact that points to the importance of back-to-basics policy development and training that focuses on words, actions, and outcomes rather than unknowable, invisible biases and other concerns that are often the subject of agency policies and training.

From vetting new hires to holding veteran officers accountable, from training priorities to internal affairs operations—the consistent failures of MPD and elected officials in the years prior to George Floyd’s death show an agency that was far more dysfunctional than most law enforcement agencies in the United States. And that dysfunction appears to have ultimately been rooted in a lack of commonsense priorities.

 

 

About the Author

Matt Dolan, J.D.

Matt Dolan is a licensed attorney who specializes in training and advising public safety agencies in matters of legal liability, risk management and ethical leadership.  His training focuses on helping agency leaders create ethically and legally sound policies and procedures as a proactive means of minimizing liability and maximizing agency effectiveness.  

A member of a law enforcement family dating back three generations, he serves as both Director and Public Safety Instructor with Dolan Consulting Group.

In December of 2024, he published his first book, Police Liability: A Guide for Law Enforcement Leaders of All Ranks.

His training courses include Internal Affairs Investigations: Legal Liability and Best Practices, Supervisor Liability for Law Enforcement, Recruiting and Hiring for Law Enforcement, Confronting the Toxic Officer, Performance Evaluations for Public Safety and Confronting Bias in Law Enforcement.

 

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to constitute legal advice on a specific case.  The information herein is presented for informational purposes only.  Individual legal cases should be referred to proper legal counsel.

 

 

 

 

References

[1] Lou Raguse, “Minneapolis Had More Homicides in 2024 than 2023”, KARE 11 News, January 1, 2025. Accessed March 5, 2025 at: https://www.kare11.com/article/news/local/minneapolis-had-more-homicides-in-2024-than-2023/89-c047909f-aa1a-4a81-ace7-97a13f6cff83#:~:text=In%20Minneapolis%2C%20there%20were%2048,to%20Minneapolis%20Police%20crime%20data.

[2] Jason Rantala, “Minneapolis Police Boost Numbers for the First Time in 5 Years,” CBS WCCO News, January 12, 2025. Accessed March 5 at: https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/minneapolis-police-boost-numbers-5-years/

[3] Martin Kaste, “Minneapolis Voters Reject a Measure to Replace the City’s Police Department,” NPR News, November 3, 2021. Accessed March 5, 2025 at:  https://www.npr.org/2021/11/02/1051617581/minneapolis-police-vote

[4] KMSP Fox 9 News, “Minneapolis Police Investigation: DOJ Found It Violated People’s Constitutional Rights,” KMSP Fox 9 News, June 16, 2023. Accessed March 6 at: https://www.fox9.com/news/minneapolis-police-department-doj-investigation-results

[5] Brandt Williams, “Minneapolis Officer Ordered Back on the Job after Firing for Punching Handcuffed Man,” Minnesota Public Radio News, December 2, 2019. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2019/12/02/minneapolis-officer-ordered-back-on-the-job-after-firing-for-punching-handcuffed-man

[6] Nicole Norfleet, “Minneapolis Police Training Aims to Help Officers Recognize Biases,” Minnesota Star Tribune, June 24, 2015. Accessed on March 8, 2025 at: https://www.startribune.com/minneapolis-police-training-aims-to-help-officers-recognize-biases/309674441

[7] KMSP FOX 9 News, “Graduating Minneapolis Police Officers Reflect on Diversity,” KMSP FOX 9 News, November 1, 2017. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.fox9.com/news/graduating-minneapolis-police-officers-reflect-on-diversity; Libor Jany, “With Few Women in Top Spots, Minneapolis Police Face a Challenge Diversifying Force: Chief “Committed to Doing More” to Diversify Ranks,” Minnesota Star Tribune, April 1, 2018. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.startribune.com/with-few-women-in-top-spots-minneapolis-police-face-a-challenge-diversifying-force/478499673; Brandt Williams, “Minneapolis Police Make An Effort To Hire More Minority Officers,” National Public Radio Morning Edition, September 3, 2014. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.npr.org/2014/09/03/345308385/minneapolis-pd-makes-an-effort-to-hire-more-minority-officers

[8] Libor Jany, “Minneapolis Police Announce New Transgender, Gender Nonconformity Policy: The New Rules Will Require Officers to Address Transgender People Using Their Preferred Names and Pronouns,” Minnesota Star Tribune, September 22, 2016. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.startribune.com/mpls-police-announce-new-transgender-gender-nonconformity-policy/394319441

[9] Brandt Williams, “Janee Harteau Sworn In as Minneapolis Police Chief,” Minnesota Public Radio News, December 4, 2012. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2012/12/04/janee-harteau-sworn-in-as-mpls-police-chief

[10] Libor Jany, “New Minneapolis Police Liaison Works to Build Bridges to LGBTQ Community,” Minnesota Star Tribune, June 21, 2019. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.startribune.com/new-minneapolis-police-liaison-works-to-build-bridges-to-lgbtq-community/511659802

[11] Barndt Williams, “Minneapolis Police Say Body Cameras Showing Immediate Benefits,” Minnesota Public Radio News, November 2, 2016. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2016/11/02/minneapolis-police-say-body-cameras-showing-immediate-benefits 

[12] Barndt Williams, “Minneapolis Police Say Body Cameras Showing Immediate Benefits,” Minnesota Public Radio News, November 2, 2016. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2016/11/02/minneapolis-police-say-body-cameras-showing-immediate-benefits

[13] CBS WCCO News, “Minneapolis Police Officers Take Training to Better Handle Aggressive Dogs,” CBS WCCO News, January 22, 2020. Accessed February 16, 2024 at: https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/minneapolis-police-required-to-take-dog-sensitivity-training/.

[14] Matt Sepic, “Task Force to Look at Minneapolis Cops’ Off-Duty Work,” Minnesota Public Radio News, February 6, 2020. Accessed April 7, 2024 at: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2020/02/06/task-force-to-look-at-minneapolis-cops-offduty-work.

[15] Leah Beno, “Minneapolis Task Force to Reexamine MPD Off-Duty Employment Policies,” KMSP Fox 9 News, February 5, 2020. Accessed April 8, 2024 at: https://www.fox9.com/news/minneapolis-task-force-to-reexamine-mpd-off-duty-employment-policies.

[16] Amy Forliti, “Minneapolis to Pay $20 Million to Family of 911 Caller Slain by Cop,” Associated Press, May 3, 2019. Accessed on March 8, 2025 at: https://apnews.com/article/6362cd8e99c74816863622f7daf9ebf1

[17] MPR News, “Video: Confusion, Disbelief as MPD Officers Rush to Ruszczyk Shooting,” MPR News, May 24, 2019. Accessed on March 8 at:

[18] Associated Press, “Ex-Minneapolis Police Officer Mohamed Noor Released from Prison in Fatal Shooting of Justine Ruszczyk Damond,” Associated Press, June 27, 2022. Accessed on March 8, 2025 at: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna35527

[19] KMSP Fox 9 News, “Prosecutors: Mohamed Noor’s Work History Shows ‘Reckless Disregard for Human Life,’” KMSP Fox 9 News, September 6, 2018. Accessed on March 8, 2025 at: https://www.fox9.com/news/prosecutors-mohamed-noors-work-history-shows-reckless-disregard-for-human-life.amp

[20] David Chanen and Faiza Mahamud, “What We Know About Mohamed Noor, Minneapolis Officer who Fatally Shot Justine Damond,” Minnesota Star Tribune, July 18, 2017. Accessed on March 8, 2025 at: https://www.startribune.com/what-we-know-about-mohamed-noor-minneapolis-officer-who-fatally-shot-justine-damond/435018163

[21] KMSP Fox 9 News Staff, “Minnesota Mayors Call On State Lawmakers to Overhaul Police Arbitration Process,’” KMSP Fox 9 News, June 18, 2020. Accessed on March 8, 2025 at: https://www.fox9.com/news/minnesota-mayors-call-on-state-lawmakers-to-overhaul-police-arbitration-process.amp

[22] Jeremiah Jaconsen, “Minneapolis Police Disciplinary Changes.” Minneapolis KARE 11 News, December 29, 2020. Accessed February 20, 2024 at: https://www.kare11.com/article/news/local/minneapolis-policeannounce-disciplinary-process-changes/89-7eb47ff3-8125-4c3c-839f-dc0df7bced92.

[23] MPR News Staff, “Minneapolis Announces Changes to Police Misconduct Investigations,” MPR News, December 29, 2020. Accessed on March 8, 2025 at: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2020/12/29/minneapolis-announces-changes-to-police-misconduct-investigations

[24] Barndt Williams, “Minneapolis Police Say Body Cameras Showing Immediate Benefits,” Minnesota Public Radio News, November 2, 2016. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2016/11/02/minneapolis-police-say-body-cameras-showing-immediate-benefits

[25] Probable Cause and Information Charging Document, State of Minnesota vs. Mohamed Mohamed Noor. State of Minnesota, County of Hennepin, March 20, 2018. Accessed on March 6, 2025 at: https://web.archive.org/web/20180925104317/https://www.hennepinattorney.org/-/media/Attorney/NEWS/2018/Noor-Mohamed-cplt.pdf

[26] Scott Pelley, “60 Minutes Interviews the Prosecutors of Derek Chauvin,” CBS News, April 26, 2021. Accessed on March 8, 2025 at: https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/derek-chauvin-prosecutors-george-floyd-death-60-minutes-2021-04-25/

[27] Ibid.

 

Internal affairs investigators, police leaders, and veteran officers can attest to the fact that certain types of police misconduct tend to appear again and again over time. These types of misconduct damage careers, compromise the public trust, and lead to substantial legal liability. Even with all of the distinct details that may be involved in a particular case, there are 4 common pitfalls that lead to investigations, terminations, and convictions.  These 4 pitfalls are not unique to law enforcement, or to the 21^st Century.

These 4 pitfalls were identified long before the existence of American policing. Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), whose feast day was celebrated last month by the Catholic Church, is widely recognized as one of the greatest theologians in the history of Christianity. Whether or not you adhere to Christianity, it is important to note that he was also a philosopher, widely recognized in Western culture by more than just religious believers. A suitable summary of Aquinas’ work and contributions to the studies of theology, civics, and ethics is not something that can be provided in a short article. You probably are not reading this for that purpose anyway. What is important to know, for our purposes, is that 800 years after his death, Aquinas’ observations about human beings and their common paths to self-destruction are as relevant today as they were then.

The 4 pitfalls that Aquinas identified involve the excessive pursuit of wealth, pleasure, power, and status.[i] Aquinas’ 4 pitfalls were more recently summarized by Bishop Robert Barron:

One of the most fundamental problems in the spiritual order is that we sense within ourselves the hunger for God, but we attempt to satisfy it with some[thing] that is less than God. Thomas Aquinas said that the four typical substitutes for God are wealth, pleasure, power, and honor.[ii]

Many readers may be uncomfortable with the notion that honor, even in excess, could be a bad thing, as this term is so often tied to a law enforcement officer’s integrity or honesty. A plausible alternative for honor may be prestige, status, or reputation. As the legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden said, “Be more concerned with your character than with your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what people think you are.”[iii]

A law enforcement leader does not have to share Aquinas’ Christian faith to see that the replacement of the police officer’s mission undertaken by police officers—that of preventing crime and disorder and serving the public—in favor of something less than that mission is a proven path to liability and public trust disasters. Today’s news headlines, internal affairs files, and court dockets pertaining to police misconduct exemplify these 4 pitfalls.

The excessive pursuit of wealth is possibly the simplest pitfall to spot. “Double-dipping” scandals involving financial fraud, overtime fraud, and other forms of theft by officers are all clearly rooted in an excessive pursuit of wealth that blinds them to the oath that they took when they became police officers. We must also consider officers who pursue a promotion, not out of a desire to take a position of formal leadership in the department, but rather simply and solely out of a desire to increase their salaries. The reality of officers’ need to provide financially for their families is undeniable. But so is the damage done to a department when officers work off-duty or overtime to the point of exhaustion, or leadership roles are filled by individuals who are completely uninterested in the vital task of supervision but are, instead, focused only on a pay increase.

The excessive pursuit of pleasure is all too easy to find in the headlines of alleged sexual misconduct involving members of the public or sexual harassment involving members of the department. The agency mission has clearly been supplanted when sexual misconduct is prioritized over public service in the field. Public complaints of an agency being understaffed and overworked tend to fall on deaf ears with the public when it is revealed that officers found time for sex on duty or rampant sexual harassment.

The excessive pursuit of power is found in the various instances of “badge heavy” behavior, sometimes classified as “uniform courage.” In these instances, the authority of a law enforcement officer is abused in a way that diminishes the people an officer encounters and, they seem to believe, elevates them to a position of superiority. Furthermore, cases of sexual misconduct, in which vulnerable individuals are victimized, inevitably involve this pursuit of power as well as pleasure.

The excessive pursuit of status can be seen in cases of fabricated arrests made to win agency accolades, or in response to inappropriate pressure from supervisors to “hit numbers” in terms of tickets written or arrests made without regard for quality as well as quantity. But other kinds of misconduct also fall into this category—such as supervisors and executives ignoring underlying misconduct problems to protect their own standing and advancement. In other words, some police leaders are more concerned with the potential fallout associated with identifying problems—as that fallout pertains to their own reputation and position—than they are concerned with the actual underlying issue of misconduct.

For internal affairs operations, it would seem to make common sense to first recognize the 4 pitfalls, as they serve as a comprehensive summary of countless IA cases, viral videos, and lawsuits. Furthermore, all agency leaders should be cognizant of these 4 pitfalls in the hiring and training process. An applicant or new hire who demonstrates that he or she was attracted to law enforcement because of an interest in wealth, pleasure, power, or status should be scrutinized with an eye to the long-term ramifications of ignoring these traits.

The defining feature that these four pursuits have in common, as evidenced by every history book in the library, by every file of an internal affairs division “frequent flier,” and by our own experiences, is that there is never enough of the wealth, pleasure, power, or status when we chase these things. In making this critical point, Aquinas cited the Gospel story of Jesus and the woman at the well, in which Jesus speaks to the unquenchable nature of these kind of thirsts, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again.”[iv]

There is never enough money to quench the thirst of the deputy who engages in overtime fraud. There is never enough sexual gratification for the trooper who engages in sex on duty. There is never enough personal satisfaction for the officer who abuses police powers by verbally or physically abusing citizens. There is never enough recognition for the sergeant who prioritizes accolades and prestigious assignments over the fundamentals of supervision.

Agency leaders should recognize that the 4 pitfalls are all derived from a failure to focus on public service, a mission that is greater than an individual, and the honorable motivation  of well-intentioned men and women entering a career in law enforcement in the first place.

Lastly, and without making any excuses for individual officers who violate the public trust in the pursuit of wealth, pleasure, power, and status, it is imperative that agency leaders do their best to place guard rails and safeguards in place to limit the likelihood that officers will fall into one or more of the 4 pitfalls.

If the agency does not regularly scrutinize overtime and secondary employment work to ensure that fraud is not occurring, the temptation to abuse the system for financial gain becomes greater.

If allegations of sexual misconduct or sexual harassment, on or off duty, are not investigated fully, the temptation to engage in these acts becomes greater.

If complaints ranging from officer demeanor to constitutional violations are not investigated promptly and thoroughly—regardless of the apparent trustworthiness of the complainant based on their past convictions, mental health disorders, substance abuse issues, etc.—the temptation to abuse police power becomes greater.

And if supervisors are not compelled to regularly “inspect what they expect” to identify problems early, the temptation to actively ignore or even cover-up wrongdoing in order to protect their own standing and reputation becomes greater.

Internal affairs investigators, supervisors, and law enforcement executives are in the business of leading human beings. So, the recognition of timeless and common human failings should be at the forefront of their minds in order to prevent, identify, and address the excessive pursuit of wealth, pleasure, power, and status by members of their agency.

These 4 pitfalls are every bit as present in law enforcement today as they were in the people who Saint Thomas Aquinas observed 800 years ago. Recognizing these pitfalls should guide agency leaders as they seek to improve agency operations, maintain the public trust, and do all that they can to protect their people from themselves.

 

 

 

About the Author

Matt Dolan, J.D.

Matt Dolan is a licensed attorney who specializes in training and advising public safety agencies in matters of legal liability, risk management, and ethical leadership.  His training focuses on helping agency leaders create ethically and legally sound policies and procedures as a proactive means of minimizing liability and maximizing agency effectiveness.  

 

A member of a law enforcement family dating back three generations, he serves as both Director and an instructor with Dolan Consulting Group. He has trained thousands of law enforcement professionals over the last decade.

In December of 2024, he published his first book, Police Liability: A Guide for Law Enforcement Leaders of All Ranks.

His training courses include Internal Affairs Investigations: Legal Liability and Best Practices, Supervisor Liability for Law Enforcement, Recruiting and Hiring for Law Enforcement, Confronting the Toxic Officer, Performance Evaluations for Public Safety, and Confronting Bias in Law Enforcement.

 

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to constitute legal advice on a specific case.  The information herein is presented for informational purposes only.  Individual legal cases should be referred to proper legal counsel.

 

 

 

References

[i] Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, First Part of the Second Part, Question 2

[ii] Bishop Robert Barron, Catholicism: A Journey to the Heart of the Faith (New York, NY: Random House / Image, 2014), 43.

[iii] Pat Williams and Jim Denney, Coach Wooden: The 7 Principles That Shaped His Life and Will Change Yours (Revell, 2011).

[iv] The Holy Bible, John 4:13

 

 

When I entered law enforcement as a deputy in 1980, I had just completed three years as a scholarship athlete, playing Division One basketball for Western Carolina University. I was in the best shape of my life. But within a few years of police work, I had put on a significant amount of weight, and I would struggle with poor physical fitness for much of my 32-year career.

So, when I speak about the importance of physical fitness for the men and women of law enforcement, I do not speak as the model of fitness without empathy for physical fitness struggles. Rather, I speak as someone who can attest, based on my own personal experience, to the challenges associated with a poor diet, lack of physical exercise, and the poor physical fitness that follows.

I was blessed to have an amazing 32-year career in this profession that I love, and I am proud of my service as a deputy, officer, and chief of police. But in retrospect, I know, without a doubt, that I would have benefited immensely from prioritizing my physical health, both professionally and personally. As a retired chief who now travels the country as a training consultant, my much-improved state of physical fitness has been vital to my ability to maintain my busy pace at the age of 67 years old. I wish I had been in this kind of physical shape during all my years on the job.

It is from this perspective that I am so troubled to see law enforcement agencies across the country lowering physical fitness standards or even eliminating them all together, knowing what we do about the impact of law enforcement work on the physical and mental well-being of officers. Law enforcement leaders should be doing just the opposite of the current trend—instead of lowering standards, they should be raising standards for physical fitness and incentivizing cops to stay in shape throughout their careers.

Let me be clear, this is not a time to target and punish honorable, competent and hard-working officers in the profession today who are not as physically fit as they should be—or would like to be. But it is precisely the time for leaders to stop ignoring what is painfully obvious: physical health allows our officers to be more effective on the clock and improves their quality of life off the clock. 

I am very open to the idea that sit-ups, push-ups, and other traditional metrics of fitness may not measure the exact types of physical abilities required in a law enforcement career. I don’t recall having to do pushups or sit-ups while working the street. But I do recall having to scale backyard fences and wrestle suspects into a pair of handcuffs. I do recall having to run up flights of stairs and help carry arrestees. Perhaps we need to replace the older models of physical fitness testing with newer, scenario-based measurements of fitness, or tests that better represent the reality of what is required on the job. What we cannot do is simply lower standards or eliminate tests altogether.

If someone had told me at the beginning of my law enforcement career in 1980 that I was required to maintain a specific physical fitness standard to keep my job as a cop, I would have undoubtedly prioritized fitness. I cannot accept the notion that we do not have men and women entering the profession today who share that same level of commitment. The vast majority of officers avoid certain behaviors, people, or places that might put their careers and pensions at risk. I am certain that if maintaining a reasonable fitness standard was also a requirement, they would do that too. 

Throughout their careers, in every reasonable way, we should be incentivizing and assisting our officers to maintain physical fitness. Doing so will allow them to thrive as professionals, spouses, and parents. It will cut down on work-related injuries and disability claims. While there has been a much-needed increase in the willingness on the part of police leaders to make mental health resources available to officers in an effort to maintain emotional well-being, there is no question that mental health and physical health are often related. So why, then, would so many law enforcement leaders allow physical fitness standards to drop while, at the same time, recognizing that officers’ mental health is an area in which improvement is desperately needed?

I cannot think of a better New Year’s resolution for law enforcement leaders in 2025 than to start moving toward (1) enhancing the physical fitness requirements for new hires, and (2) instituting initiatives to encourage the great men and women of law enforcement who we have already hired to become and stay physically healthy throughout this noble but challenging career.

 

 

 

About the Author

Harry P. Dolan is a 32-year police veteran who served as a Chief of Police since 1987. As one of the nation’s most experienced police chiefs, he brings 25 years of public safety executive experience to Dolan Consulting Group. He retired in October 2012 as Chief of Police of the Raleigh (N.C.) Police Department, an agency comprised of nearly 900 employees in America’s 42nd largest city.

Chief Dolan began his law enforcement career in 1980 as a deputy sheriff in Asheville, North Carolina and served there until early 1982, when he joined the Raleigh Police Department, where he served as a patrol officer. In 1987, he was appointed Chief of Police for the N.C. Department of Human Resources Police Department, located in Black Mountain. He served as Chief of Police in Lumberton, N.C. from 1992 until 1998, when he became Chief of Police of the Grand Rapids, Michigan Police Department. He served in that capacity for nearly ten years before becoming Chief of the Raleigh Police Department in September 2007. As Chief, he raised the bar at every organization and left each in a better position to both achieve and sustain success.

Harry Dolan has lectured throughout the United States and has trained thousands of public safety professionals in the fields of Leadership & Management, Communications Skills, and Community Policing. Past participants have consistently described Chief Dolan’s presentations as career changing, characterized by his sense of humor and unique ability to maintain participants’ interest throughout his training sessions. Chief Dolan’s demonstrated ability to connect with his clientele and deliver insightful instruction all with uncompromising principles will be of tremendous value in the private sector.

Chief Dolan’s passion to achieve service-excellence is a driving force behind Dolan Consulting Group. He is a graduate of Western Carolina University and holds a Master’s Degree in Organizational Leadership and Management from the University of North Carolina at Pembroke.

His training courses include Verbal De-escalation Training: Surviving Verbal Conflict®, Verbal De-escalation Train The Trainer Program: Surviving Verbal Conflict®, Community Policing Training, Taking the Lead: Courageous Leadership for Today’s Public Safety, and Street Sergeant®: Evidence-Based First-Line Supervision Training.

 

In the face of widespread staffing shortages, there is an inexcusable, but understandable, temptation for law enforcement leaders to lower hiring standards and skip steps in the background investigation and field training phases in an effort to get “warm bodies” onto their departments. As a result, it is painfully easy to find headlines from 2024 that illustrate the costs associated with a breakdown in the proper vetting of newly hired law enforcement officers.

In March of 2024, a Henderson, Nevada police recruit was arrested for drunk driving within 36 hours of graduating from the police academy.[i] In May, a New Orleans police recruit still in the academy was arrested for aggravated assault with a firearm.[ii] In June, a New York State Police recruit was arrested for assaulting a training instructor in the academy and attempting to take the trainer’s firearm.[iii] In July, a newly hired Kokomo, Indiana officer, still on probationary status, was arrested and charged with sexual misconduct with a minor.[iv] And in December, local news outlets reported that the Houston Police Department had hired a former Harris County detention officer in April of 2024 in spite of pending investigations into allegations of excessive use of force during his two year tenure as a jailer.[v] One local outlet reported, “ABC13 asked HPD if they knew about the past incidents when he was hired, and they said that was part of the investigation into what he disclosed on his application.”[vi]

These stories point to misconduct—on-duty and off-duty—that occurred so early in each officer’s career that burnout seemed to be an implausible explanation. Common sense dictates that, if an individual cannot manage to get through the academy and field training without making headlines for misconduct, something was likely missed in the hiring process.

The issue of negligent hiring is fundamental to every aspect of law enforcement operations—both in the near future and in the long term. It is in the hiring phase, with a particular emphasis on background investigations and field training, that law enforcement leaders have a unique opportunity to minimize the liability that comes to bear throughout the course of an officer’s career.

The 2024 stories referenced above come on the heels of a Department of Justice (DOJ) report in October of 2023 urging law enforcement leaders to “modernize eligibility requirements.”[vii] These “modernization” recommendations included removing barriers to entry such as physical fitness, past drug use, ability to pass a written test, past criminal offenses and much else.[viii] In other words, the DOJ report formally touted what too many agencies have adopted informally—lowering hiring standards to fill open officer positions.  

While there are undoubtedly agencies that need to reevaluate some eligibility requirements—such as those pertaining to maximum age limits, college credit hours attained, or other requirements which seem to bear little or no relationship to an applicant’s character, competence, or integrity—the eligibility items highlighted by the DOJ report imply that now is the time to lower standards, hire “warm bodies,” and deal with the fallout later. Law enforcement leaders should, instead, follow their ethical compasses and apply common sense. They should look to their own experiences within their agencies, and to the history of modern American policing, and subsequently reject this short-sighted and unethical philosophy of rushed hiring and lowered standards.

At this moment, the law enforcement profession, and the citizens who depend on it, need agency leaders to meet the ethical challenge of resisting the temptation to hire unqualified applicants. In the long run, these applicants have the potential to inflict tremendous damage on agencies, the profession, and the communities that these agencies serve. 

The last thing that officers and citizens need now is unqualified new hires in law enforcement who will ultimately bring disrepute to the profession, rather than further the mission to protect and serve. By learning from the mistakes of the past, being wary of common hiring pitfalls and understanding the long-term impact of negligent hiring practices, agency leaders can uphold their integrity and that of the profession without contributing to the detriment of their agencies and communities.

 

You Cannot Outsource Negligent Hiring Liability

In recent years, many states have attempted to assist local law enforcement agencies in identifying officers with past misconduct issues in an effort to prevent bad actors from moving from agency to agency and being hired without proper regard for their past actions. The legislation passed in these states includes certification and de-certification processes, increased funding and resources for state-wide accreditation bodies, as well as mandates for local agencies to better communicate with one another in service of more thorough background investigations.

In 2017, the State of Michigan passed a law intended to help end the problem of “gypsy cops”, who bounce from agency to agency engaging in a pattern of misconduct, by mandating thorough background investigations on the part of law enforcement agencies conducting lateral hiring of certified officers. The legislation also required transparent communication on the part of officers’ current or former agencies of employment (1) with the state accreditation body at the time of separation, and (2) with other law enforcement agencies when one of their officers or former officers sought a law enforcement position elsewhere in the state. But this legislation has by no means eliminated negligent hiring cases in which local police leaders fail to conduct thorough, back-to-basics background investigations that go beyond state certification.[ix] In fact, in November, the Detroit Police Department self-reported that 30 of their active officers were not properly licensed with the State of Michigan and had to be placed on administrative duty.[x]

In one particularly disturbing 2023 case out of Michigan, a public safety director, when asked by a local reporter if the agency failed to conduct a thorough background investigation when hiring an officer with a history of very public on-duty misconduct with a nearby agency, responded: “No. Not at all. We’re not the licensing authority. The State of Michigan is and we go by what they say.”[xi]

Illinois is another state that has passed legislation in recent years aimed at preventing the hiring of officers with checkered histories.[xii] But, much like the situation in Michigan, the reality remains that local law enforcement agencies are still ultimately responsible for engaging in legally and ethically defensible hiring practices.

This local responsibility in hiring officers, and the consequences of failures in legally and ethically defensible hiring practices, were brought to national attention following the fatal shooting of Sonya Massey in 2024. Massey, a mentally ill, unarmed woman, was shot and killed by a Sangamon County Sheriff’s deputy who was hired in spite of past misconduct issues in his personal life and as a law enforcement officer at other Illinois agencies. The fatal shooting occurred less than 4 miles from the Illinois State Capitol where the aforementioned legislation was passed.[xiii]

The now former Sheriff of Sangamon County, who eventually stepped down in the wake of Massey’s death and subsequent evidence of the deputy’s checkered past in law enforcement, defended the deputy’s hiring in a local news interview as follows:

 

“There is absolutely nothing in his background that would decertify him from working in law enforcement,” Campbell said. “The State of Illinois, the State Standards Board had certified him six times over and over and over again to continue working with law enforcement. There was nothing that we could have predicted.”[xiv]

 

The financial cost of negligent hiring practices is evident in cases brought by plaintiffs like Yareni Rios-Gonzalez in Colorado. Rios-Gonzalez was handcuffed and left in a squad car parked on train tracks when a train struck and severely injured her. The officer in whose squad car she was placed had recently been hired by his agency despite being labeled incompetent at his previous law enforcement agency. A demotion had been recommended by the previous agency, in light of an internal affairs investigation and concern expressed by fellow officers that he showed disregard for his own safety and the safety of others.[xv]

In June of 2024, Rios-Gonzalez reached a settlement in the amount of $8.5 million, receiving equal payments from the two cities whose officers were involved in her arrest. The cities, whose police leaders had hired and deployed the officers on the scene – not the State of Colorado, its law enforcement accrediting body, or any other outside entity tasked with assisting local police leaders in their hiring decisions – were liable for the incident. [xvi] 

Hopefully, state accreditation bodies will continually improve in assisting individual agencies in the hiring process—particularly as it pertains to hiring laterals from within that state. However, it is clear that when negligent hiring practices lead to the deployment of individuals unfit for the job, the fallout from their subsequent negligence or misconduct falls first and foremost on the agencies that hired them, the agency name which is displayed on the badges that they wear, and not the state body that has certified them.

 

If We Are Hiring Applicants Without Leaving the Office—

We Are Doing Something Wrong

 

Technological advancements have undoubtedly made it possible for background investigators to disqualify applicants with increased efficiency and decreased time commitment. Many dishonest statements on a personal history statement can be readily identified by checking various databases online. Social media activity can be checked for blatantly disqualifying conduct without the necessity of an investigator leaving the office. But these advancements tend only to assist investigators in disqualifying candidates, rather than approving them for hire. These tools are generally limited to identifying automatic disqualifiers and the kind of commonsense disqualifiers that are obvious to anyone with internet access.

The real work for background investigators, which must be done before approving a candidate, requires an out-of-office-experience. Technological advancements have not replaced methods including, but not limited to, a home visit, neighborhood canvass, and interviews with past supervisors, FTOs, and firearms instructors.

Law enforcement leaders should be prepared to defend their hiring practices by describing their efforts, outside of minimal in-office background checks, to identify possible character, integrity, and competence issues revealed by past conduct. This is particularly true in light of the financial and public trust costs associated with bad hires, when compared to the costs associated with a thorough background investigation. 

 

About the Author

Matt Dolan, J.D.

Matt Dolan is a licensed attorney who specializes in training and advising public safety agencies in matters of legal liability, risk management and ethical leadership.  His training focuses on helping agency leaders create ethically and legally sound policies and procedures as a proactive means of minimizing liability and maximizing agency effectiveness.  

A member of a law enforcement family dating back three generations, he serves as both Director and Public Safety Instructor with Dolan Consulting Group. 

His training courses include Internal Affairs Investigations: Legal Liability and Best Practices, Supervisor Liability for Law Enforcement, Recruiting and Hiring for Law Enforcement, Confronting the Toxic Officer, Performance Evaluations for Public Safety and Confronting Bias in Law Enforcement.

 

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to constitute legal advice on a specific case.  The information herein is presented for informational purposes only.  Individual legal cases should be referred to proper legal counsel.

 

 

 

References
______________________________

[i] C.C. McCandless, “Report: Probationary Henderson Police Officer ‘Swerving All Over the Road’ at Time of DUI Arrest,” FOX 5 KVVU-TV News, March 26, 2024. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://www.fox5vegas.com/2024/03/26/report-probationary-henderson-police-officer-swerving-all-over-road-time-dui-arrest/

[ii] Keli Freeman, “NOPD Recruit Arrested, Accused of Assault,” WDSU News, May 15, 2024. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://www.wdsu.com/article/nopd-recruit-arrested-for-assault/60791531

[iii] Jon Moss, “’Erratic’ NY State Police Recruit Tries to Grab Training Officer’s Gun at Cazenovia Academy, Troopers Say,” Syracuse.com, July 30, 2024. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://www.syracuse.com/news/2024/07/erratic-ny-state-police-recruit-tries-to-grab-training-officers-gun-at-cazenovia-academy-troopers-say.html

[iv] Gregg Montgomery, “Former Cop Charged with Sexual Misconduct with Juvenile,” Syracuse.com, July 23, 2024. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://www.wishtv.com/news/crime-watch-8/former-cop-charged-with-sexual-misconduct-with-juvenile/

[v] Mycah Hatfield, “Investigation into How HPD Hired Ex-Detention Officer at Center of Several Investigations Continues,” KTRK-TV News, December 16, 2024. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://abc13.com/post/ex-harris-county-detention-officer-deven-ortiz-was-allowed-resign-despite-several-investigations/15664981/

[vi] Ibid.

[vii] Bureau of Justice Assistance and Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, Recruitment and Retention for the Modern Law Enforcement Agency: Revised (Washington, DC: Office of Community Oriented Policing Services,

2023).

[viii] BJA and COPS, Recruitment and Retention for the Modern Law Enforcement Agency, 4.

[ix] Kevin Deitz, “Bad Officers Let Go Due to Misconduct Moving Easily to New Departments,” WDIV-TV Click On Detroit News, June 27, 2017. Accessed February 17, 2024 at: https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/2017/06/27/bad-officers-let-go-due-to-misconduct-moving-easily-to-new-departments-sheriff-says/.

[x] Ross Jones, “DPD Pulls 30 Officers Off the Street Over Inactive, Lapsed Law Enforcement Licenses,” WXYZ News, November 21, 2024. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://www.wxyz.com/news/local-news/investigations/dpd-pulls-30-officers-off-the-street-over-inactive-lapsed-law-enforcement-licenses#google_vignette

[xi] Ross Jones, “State Reviews How Officer Joined Eastpointe Police While Facing Firing in Detroit,” WXYZ News, May 17, 2023. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://www.wxyz.com/news/local-news/investigations/state-reviews-how-officer-joined-eastpointe-police-while-facing-firing-in-detroit

[xii] NBC Chicago, “Here’s What to Know About Illinois’ SAFE-T Act and the NEW Changes Coming,” NBC Chicago News, December 2, 2024. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/heres-what-to-know-about-illinois-safe-t-act-and-the-new-changes-coming/3011535/

[xiii] Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office Press Release, “Illinois State Police Announce Investigation into Officer Involved Shooting Continues,” Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office, July 10, 2024: Accessed on December 30, 2024 at: https://sangamonil.gov/departments/s-z/sheriff/sonya-massey-information#:~:text=On%20July%206%2C%202024%20at,deceased%20at%20an%20area%20hospital.

[xiv] Danny Connolly, “Sheriff Campbell Planning Policy Changes After Deputy Shooting of Sonya Massey,” WCIA News, August 1, 2024. Accessed December 23, 2024 at: https://www.wcia.com/news/sheriff-campbell-planning-policy-changes-after-deputy-shooting-of-sonya-massey/

[xv] Brian Maas, “Platteville Police Officer Parked on Train Tracks Called ‘Incompetent’ by Fellow Officers, Demotion Recommended at Previous Department,” KCNC News, October 27, 2022. Accessed February 17, 2024 at: https://www.cbsnews.com/colorado/news/platteville-police-officer-parked-train-tracks-called-incompetent-fellow-officers-demotion-recommended-sgt-pablo-vazquez/.

[xvi] Praveena Somasundaram, “Woman Handcuffed in Police Car Hit by Freight Train Reaches $8.5M Settlement,” Washington Post, June 5, 2024. Accessed June 29, 2024 at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/06/05/colorado-police-car-train-crash/.

 

 

November, 2024

In the summer of 2018, we published an article entitled The Public’s Confidence in the Police Might Be Better Than You Think that revealed two things. First, while there is always year-to-year fluctuation in public support for the police as news events sway public opinion, the overall rate of support for the police has remained fairly consistent, somewhere between 50% and 60%, for many decades. Second, compared to other social institutions—public education, congress, the presidency, the supreme court, or the news media—support for the police has been much higher for quite some time, and remains higher.

We published that article more than six years ago, before the civil unrest and George Floyd protests of the early 2020s. As we approach the midpoint of the decade, how is the law enforcement profession doing in the eyes of the American public?

Just as we did in our previous article, we rely on Gallup Poll data to address this question. The Gallup Poll conducts online and phone surveys of a random sample of roughly 2,000 persons in the United States every two weeks, selecting a different sample of 2,000 people each two-week period.       

The graph in Figure 1 below shows the 35-year trend in Gallup Poll data on public confidence in the local police from 1990 through the first half of 2024. This graph demonstrates the percentage of Americans surveyed by the Gallup Organization who indicated that they had “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in their local police, year by year. As one can see, when massive and sensational news coverage focuses on a case of alleged police misconduct or corruption, public confidence in the police declines for a couple of years before rebounding. When the nation begins to remember why it needs the police, such as after mass police layoffs or when violent protests erupt, public confidence rises again. The data reveal that 2024 has seen a strong rebound in public confidence in their local police. 

Figure 1. Gallup Poll Data on Public Confidence in the Police (1990-2024)

Source: Dolan Consulting Group LLC with Gallup data

What is most interesting about this 2024 rebound in public confidence in the local police is the demographic makeup of people whose attitudes have improved. According to Gallup, those who have historically expressed the highest confidence in the local police have been political conservatives, persons over the age of 55, and Whites. A Gallup study compared the 2023 to the 2024 data and revealed that the recent increases in public confidence in the local police have occurred most among persons aged 18-34 (a 59% increase), persons of color (a 42% increase), and political independents (a 32% increase).[1]

One plausible explanation for this demographic breakdown in support for the police is found in examining who is impacted most by crime, and who is most reliant on the help of local police. Crime in the United States disproportionately impacts young adult men in communities of color–demographics that correspond with the greatest surges in support for local police.[2] In other words, those members of the public with the greatest confidence in their local police are found in the demographic categories most likely to be victims of crime.[3]       

While those of us who believe in the vital mission of law enforcement officers would like to see these public trust numbers go even higher, Americans have an inherent mistrust of all government institutions, which inevitably impacts their trust in the police. Numerous surveys that have compared American attitudes with those of other Western democracies, such as Great Britain, France, Germany, Spain, and Japan, consistently reveal that Americans have the greatest sense of cynicism toward government institutions.[4]

So how does public confidence in law enforcement stack up against public confidence in other government institutions? Law enforcement in the U.S. is overwhelmingly a local government function, with 90% of law enforcement officers employed at the municipal or county level.[5] The only other local government institution consistently included in Gallup Poll public confidence surveys has been public education. So how does public confidence in law enforcement compare to public confidence in public education since 1994?

Figure 2 compares the trend in public confidence in the police, with public confidence in public education, from 1990 through the first half of 2024. As this graph reveals, public confidence in public education has had year-to-year fluctuations that somewhat mirror public confidence in the local police. However, public confidence in public education has consistently been far below that of local law enforcement.

Figure 2. Gallup Poll Data on Public Confidence in Police and Public Education (1990-2024)

Source: Dolan Consulting Group LLC with Gallup data

Since the early 1990s, public education has struggled to reach the 40% confidence mark. In the wake of the pandemic, public confidence in public education plummeted below 30%. Even at its lowest points, public confidence in local police has been almost 15 percentage points higher than public confidence in public education. This is particularly striking when we note that local law enforcement agencies are routinely impacted by police misconduct that occurs hundreds or thousands of miles away, while this is rarely, if ever, true of local schools.

What about other government institutions? Public education and local law enforcement are the only local government institutions that the Gallup Organization tracks with its public confidence surveys. It does, however, track several federal government institutions including the Congress, the President, and the U.S. Supreme Court. How does public confidence in the police compare to public confidence in these three pillars of our national government?

Figure 3 below reveals the levels of public confidence in the police alongside the levels of public confidence in Congress, the President, and the Supreme Court. As this graph reveals, since 1990, public confidence in law enforcement has remained much higher than public confidence in the three pillars of the federal government. Even at its worst, public confidence in the police has been almost 20 percentage points higher than public confidence in the Supreme Court or the President at their best. In the first half of 2024, public confidence in the local police was 43 percentage points higher than public confidence in Congress! One would think this finding would merit some national news attention.

Figure 3. Gallup Poll Public Confidence in Police and Federal Government (1990-2024)

Source: Dolan Consulting Group LLC with Gallup data

Of course, the law enforcement profession should continue to work hard to improve its image among the American public. Nevertheless, compared to other government institutions at the local and national level, it appears that the law enforcement profession is doing well in terms of overall public confidence.

But for countless members of law enforcement, it doesn’t seem like the public confidence in the police is high. Negative media coverage of the police is undoubtedly a factor in this perception among officers. This is ironic, in light of the fact that the American public’s confidence in the news media is substantially lower than its confidence in the police.

Our final graph in Figure 4 compares the Gallup Poll data on public confidence in the police, with Gallup Poll data on public confidence in the television news media, newspapers, and in the mass news media in general. Television news media refers to all news outlets that began as a television station, either on antenna broadcast or cable television. This includes the news branches of ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX, CNN, MSNBC, Uniden, Telemundo, RT, Al-Jazeera, and the like. The newspaper category refers to newspapers in either print or online format. The final category refers to all news media in general, whether distributed via print, television, radio, podcast, social media, or online. Data in this last category has only been available since 1997.

Figure 4. Gallup Poll Public Confidence in Police and News Media (1990-2024)     

Source: Dolan Consulting Group LLC with Gallup data

Since the mid-1990s, the American public has had greater confidence in local law enforcement than in any form of news media. Note that this is not a measure of readership or viewership. Of course, with the expansion of the internet there has been declining readership for print newspapers and viewership of television news broadcasts. But this is a survey of whether Americans trust these institutions to do their jobs and do them competently. Trust in newspapers was well below 50% before the 1990s began, and television news plummeted to the level of newspapers by the end of the 1990s. Confidence in both of these news sources has continued to decline over the last two-and-a-half decades. In the wake of the pandemic and the 2020 election, public confidence in television news fell below 20%, and public confidence in newspapers fell to 11%.

Most people would consider it a crisis if only about 1 in 10 people in a democracy trusted their free press. As of the first half of 2024, public confidence in the local police was more than 30 percentage points higher than confidence in television news, and almost 40 percentage points higher than confidence in newspapers. The birth of more independent, purely online news sources has contributed to the higher confidence ratings for the general mass news media.[6] Nevertheless, even this category remains in decline and lags behind the local police by 20 percentage points. It may well be time for the news media to take a long hard look at its own practices, and its own public confidence crisis, before spending quite so much time and effort decrying the public’s supposed lack of trust in the law enforcement profession.

In summary, public confidence in the police has remained fairly stable over the last 35 years, mostly fluctuating between 50% and 60% from year to year. While it is vital that police leaders continually work to improve public trust in law enforcement, confidence in the police has remained much higher than public confidence in most other government institutions, including public education, Congress, the President, and the Supreme Court. Finally, for almost four decades, public confidence in all news media sources has been declining and is significantly lower than the level of public confidence in law enforcement.

For law enforcement officers in the field, this data indicates that (1) there is a great deal of public trust to be protected through the diligent work in which officers engage on a daily basis in the communities that they protect and serve, and (2) officers should be very wary of letting institutions that lack public trust themselves to define their work and their profession.

References  

---

[1] Brenan, M. (2024, July 15). U.S. Confidence in Institutions Mostly Flat, but Police Up: Average Confidence in Institutions Remains Historically Low, at 28%. Gallup Organization. Accessed at: https://news.gallup.com/poll/647303/confidence-institutions-mostly-flat-police.aspx

[2] Seifert, D., Andrea Lambe, Sven Anders, Klaus Pueschel, and A. Heinemann. (2009). Quantitative Analysis of Victim Demographics and Injury Characteristics at a Metropolitan Medico-Legal Center. Forensic Science International 188, (1-3): 46-51; Varline, Jayden (2024). Crime Incidents and Victim Demographics: An Examination of Reporting Behaviours. Journal of Victimology and Victim Justice: 25166069241245774.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Mauk, D., & Oakland, J. (2008). American Civilization: An Introduction. New York, Routledge.

[5] Reaves, B. A. (2011). Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies, 2008. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics.

[6] Brenan, M. (2024, October 14). Americans’ Trust in Media Remains at Trend Low. Accessed at: https://news.gallup.com/poll/651977/americans-trust-media-remains-trend-low.aspx

 

Over the last few years, we at Dolan Consulting Group have published an article early in the year focused on the topic of negligent hiring liability in law enforcement. We do this because the issue of negligent hiring is so fundamental to every other aspect of law enforcement operations in the near future and in the long term.

Unfortunately, year after year, the causes for concern in this area have not diminished and, in some respects, have only grown. More and more of the conversations we have with law enforcement leaders across the country involve their concerns about their agencies lowering standards in order to hire “warm bodies,” and new cautionary case studies in this area continue to emerge with disturbing regularity. Sadly, once again, it seems that an updated article on this crucial topic is necessary.

Even more striking than the negligent hiring decisions of individual agency leaders are the recommendations made by the Department of Justice in its report on “Recruitment and Retention for the Modern Law Enforcement Agency”, published in October of 2023.[i] Immediately following the report’s Introduction section, the DOJ report recommends that law enforcement agencies “modernize eligibility requirements.”[ii] This creative framing does not effectively disguise the thrust of the DOJ report’s recommendation—lower standards and find “warm bodies.” 

While the authors of the DOJ report repeatedly insist that their recommendations do not amount to the lowering of hiring standards, it is hard to conceive of a reasonable explanation of how the DOJ report does not recommend precisely that—lower standards of character, competence, and integrity at a time when the law enforcement profession’s reputation must be protected from the damage incurred by those unqualified to wear a badge.

The DOJ report recommends the following:

Participants at the convening identified the usefulness and supported the development of a national standard for police hiring developed by accrediting bodies. They also recommended that agencies consider their current eligibility requirements, highlighting those that cannot be compromised, those that can be updated, and those others that should be added. Some stressed incorporating “room for redemption,” recognizing that brain function is not fully developed until early adulthood and that recruits may have made minor unwise decisions in their younger years that affect their hiring eligibility now….[iii]

Examples of potential items that participants identified for consideration include… considering adjustments around drug use to account for time passed and/or changes in law; assessing the need for spelling tests or other written examinations…reconsidering flat bars based on minor, isolated criminal offenses, especially where offenses occurred a long time ago; evaluating the importance of financial history and credit scores; and adapting physical fitness standards, such as distance running.[iv]  

These statements clearly encourage lowering standards pertaining to drug abuse, criminal histories, written examinations intended to measure basic literacy and reading comprehension, and physical fitness. There is also the mention of making exceptions for incidents occurring prior to “fully developed” brain function, a timeframe which is notably undefined. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, the brain finishes developing and maturing in one’s late twenties.[v] So does this mean that law enforcement agencies should overlook criminal offenses and character issues the applicant committed throughout his or her twenties?

While there are undoubtedly agencies with eligibility requirements that should be revaluated—such as those pertaining to maximum age limits, college credit hours attained or other requirements which seem to bear little or no relationship to an applicant’s character, competence, or integrity—the eligibility items highlighted by the DOJ report send the message that now is the time to lower standards, hire “warm bodies,” and deal with the fallout later. Law enforcement leaders should follow their ethical compasses and apply common sense. They should look to their own experiences with this type of short-sighted and unethical thinking in their agencies, as well as the history of modern American policing in rejecting it.

The DOJ report comes at a time when more and more law enforcement agencies are confronted with pressures to hire officers as quickly as possible and generate recruit classes that are more diverse. Leaders will inevitably face the temptation to cut corners and ignore red flags to get “boots on the ground.” These increasing pressures may regrettably mean that those boots are not filled with qualified men and women who demonstrate the character traits and competencies necessary to successfully serve their communities. Making these short-term fixes even more appealing are their delayed consequences–bad hires may not become public safety, legal liability, or public trust disasters for months or years. Short-term thinking could motivate hiring decisions that will fill the ranks today, but make for negative headlines and lawsuits for years to come.

At this moment, the law enforcement profession, and the citizens who depend on it, need agency leaders to meet the ethical challenge of resisting the temptation to hire unqualified applicants. In the long run, these applicants have the potential to inflict tremendous damage on agencies, the profession, and the communities that these agencies serve. 

The last thing that officers and citizens need now is unqualified applicants hired into the law enforcement field who will ultimately bring disrepute to the profession, rather than further the mission to protect and serve. By learning from the mistakes of the past, being wary of common hiring pitfalls and understanding the long-term impact of negligent hiring practices, agency leaders can uphold their integrity and that of the profession without contributing to the detriment of their agencies and communities.

Emphasizing Quality Over Quantity

Fortunately, in recent months, we have also seen agency leaders defending small recruit classes when they believe that quality is being preserved at the sake of quantity. In Cleveland, a December 2023 recruit class numbering just nine new officers was defended by the then-director of public safety along these lines of quality focus over quantity focus. Public Safety Director Karrie Howard told a local news outlet, “Those nine people are going to be worth, I don’t know, twenty-seven lackluster. We have nine quality superstars that graduated the academy.”[vi]   

In Tulsa, facing similar recruiting and staffing challenges, the police chief told a local news outlet in November of 2023 that “I could fill an academy class if I wanted, but I would be pushing lower-quality people through, and I just won’t do that.”[vii]

These are only two examples of what is hopefully a more broadly held belief—that lowering standards and hiring officers in a way that proves negligent is not making things better, but making them immeasurably worse for departments and the communities that they serve.

A patrol captain at a sheriff’s office recently told me that his agency was authorized for 150 sworn deputies, but was currently staffed at only 125. “I begged the Sheriff,” the captain said, “Just give me five workers and we’ll be good. Please don’t give me five workers and five problems, because then we’re back to square one. I don’t need somebody hiding behind a grocery store on their phone, or pissing people off for no reason. Just give me five workers and no new problems and we’ll be good to go.”

What that captain was talking about is a very common math equation that police leaders sometimes struggle to effectively communicate to those who are understandably eager to see the number of officers increase. Hiring “minor league” problem officers leads to lost time and proactivity, as officers and sergeants put out the fires that are set in the form of demeanor complaints, sloppy report writing, and various “professional backer-upper” activities. Hiring “major league” problem officers can lead to disastrous outcomes, as appears to have been true in so many cases like the Memphis SCORPION Unit, the Baltimore Gun Trace Task Force, the Miami River Cops, and countless other tragic examples of negligent hiring over the years. As that sheriff’s office captain explained, an agency cannot afford to hire problems that get in the way of its good workers.

The Negligent Hiring “Doom Loop”

The term “doom loop” has garnered some attention in recent years as a way of describing urban decay that seems to get worse and worse, as less safety means less business and less public finances for safety, which means less business, and so on.

The credit for coining this term in reference to urban decay seems to belong to Columbia Business School professor Dr. Stijn Van Niuwerburgh. In a 2023 New York Times article, Dr. Niuwerburgh summarized what was meant by the term “doom loop.”

People with money…move out, taking their tax dollars and retail spending with them…leaving empty storefronts… Crime and grime increase. More people feel unsafe and leave… More crime, more grime, more cuts in services.[viii]

What Dr. Van Nieuwerburgh is describing is similar in many ways to the urban decay that occurred in many American cities in the 1960s and 1970s, when many cities across the country saw that the worse things got, the worse things got. The less livable a city becomes, the more difficult it is to reverse the trend. In policing, there is a strikingly similar phenomenon in terms of lowering hiring standards. 

What the recent DOJ report seems to invite law enforcement leaders to engage in may prove to be a similar kind of “doom loop”. In this Negligent Hiring “Doom Loop,” law enforcement leaders justify lowering standards and cutting corners on background investigations because they are desperate to find applicants. This leads to hiring people who do not have the character, competency, and integrity to serve honorably as officers. These individuals, who should not have been hired, engage in misconduct. That misconduct lowers public trust in the agency, harms morale, and makes the agency even less attractive to qualified applicants who are all the more likely to look elsewhere for employment in the future. Now, it is once again tempting to lower standards even further since, as at the beginning of the Negligent Hiring “Doom Loop,” agency leaders are more desperate than ever to find applicants. 

And the damage is not just to the community’s trust in an agency, but also to morale within the agency. Good officers don’t want to work with individuals who were clearly hired under a lower standard, and good candidates don’t want to apply to an agency where people are hired and deployed without proper vetting. This is born out of the frequency with which police union leaders have publicly cautioned against lower standards, presumably on behalf of the vast majority of their membership that believes in hiring people who are assets and not liabilities.

We would urge law enforcement leaders to fight the temptation to lower standards. This mistake may be rationalized away as a temporary fix or a necessary evil. But the available case studies demonstrate that these are rarely temporary fixes and the evil that they invite is never necessary.

About the Author

Matt Dolan, J.D.

Matt Dolan is a licensed attorney who specializes in training and advising public safety agencies in matters of legal liability, risk management and ethical leadership.  His training focuses on helping agency leaders create ethically and legally sound policies and procedures as a proactive means of minimizing liability and maximizing agency effectiveness.  

A member of a law enforcement family dating back three generations, he serves as both Director and Public Safety Instructor with Dolan Consulting Group. 

His training courses include Internal Affairs Investigations: Legal Liability and Best Practices, Supervisor Liability for Law Enforcement, Recruiting and Hiring for Law Enforcement, Confronting the Toxic Officer, Performance Evaluations for Public Safety and Confronting Bias in Law Enforcement.

 

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to constitute legal advice on a specific case.  The information herein is presented for informational purposes only.  Individual legal cases should be referred to proper legal counsel.

 

 

References

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[i] Bureau of Justice Assistance and Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, Recruitment and Retention for the Modern Law Enforcement Agency: Revised (Washington, DC: Office of Community Oriented Policing Services,

2023).

[ii] BJA and COPS, Recruitment and Retention for the Modern Law Enforcement Agency, 3-4.

[iii] BJA and COPS, Recruitment and Retention for the Modern Law Enforcement Agency, 4.

[iv] BJA and COPS, Recruitment and Retention for the Modern Law Enforcement Agency, 4.

[v] Mariam Arain, Maliha Haque, Lina Johal, Puja Mathur, Wynand Nel, Afsha Rais, Ranbir Sandhu, and Sushil Sharma. “Maturation of the adolescent brain,” Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment (2013): 449-461.

[vi] Neil Fischer, “City of Cleveland Hosts Hiring Event for Police Department; Latest Academy Class Brings in Just 9 Officers,” WKYC News, December 6, 2023. Accessed on 03/03/2024 at: https://www.wkyc.com/article/news/local/cleveland/cleveland-hiring-event-police-department-latest-academy-class-9-officers/95-a19f1b91-ed6f-4b05-91ee-858d9a044abf

[vii] Brad Krehbiel, “Tulsa Police Will ‘Hold Fast’ on Standards Chief Says Despite Chronic Recruiting Difficulties,” Tulsa World, December 12, 2023. Accessed on 03/03/2024 at:

[viii] John Leland, “The Prophet of Urban Doom Says New York Still Has a Chance,” New York Times, February 8, 2023. Accessed on 02/18/2024 at: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/08/nyregion/doom-loop-remote-work-pandemic-nyc.html.