Title: Early Warning Systems: Responding to the Problem Police Officer
Series: Research in Brief
Author: Samuel Walker, Geoffrey P. Alpert, and Dennis J. Kenney
Published: National Institute of Justice, July 2001
Subject: Law enforcement: police discipline and misconduct, police
personnel, police planning and management
17 pages
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U.S. Department of Justice
Office of Justice Programs
National Institute of Justice

National Institute of Justice
Research in Brief
July 2001

Early Warning Systems: Responding to the Problem Police Officer
by Samuel Walker, Geoffrey P. Alpert, and Dennis J. Kenney

It has become a truism among police chiefs that 10 percent of their officers
cause 90 percent of the problems. Investigative journalists have
documented departments in which as few as 2 percent of all officers are
responsible for 50 percent of all citizen complaints.[1] The phenomenon of
the "problem officer" was identified in the 1970s: Herman Goldstein noted
that problem officers "are well known to their supervisors, to the top
administrators, to their peers, and to the residents of the areas in which
they work," but that "little is done to alter their conduct."[2] In 1981, the
U.S. Commission on Civil Rights recommended that all police
departments create an early warning system to identify problem officers,
those "who are frequently the subject of complaints or who demonstrate
identifiable patterns of inappropriate behavior."[3]

An early warning system is a data-based police management tool designed
to identify officers whose behavior is problematic and provide a form of
intervention to correct that performance. As an early response, a
department intervenes before such an officer is in a situation that warrants
formal disciplinary action. The system alerts the department to these
individuals and warns the officers while providing counseling or training
to help them change their problematic behavior.

By 1999, 39 percent of all municipal and county law enforcement agencies
that serve populations greater than 50,000 people either had an early
warning system in place or were planning to implement one. The growing
popularity of these systems as a remedy for police misconduct raises
questions about their effectiveness and about the various program
elements that are associated with effectiveness. To date, however, little has
been written on the subject.[4] This Brief reports on the first indepth
investigation of early warning systems. The investigation combined the
results of a national survey of law enforcement agencies with the findings
of case studies of three agencies with established systems.

How prevalent are early warning systems?

As part of the national evaluation of early warning systems, the Police
Executive Research Forum--funded by the National Institute of Justice and
the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services--surveyed 832
sheriffs' offices and municipal and county police departments serving
populations of 50,000 or more.[5] Usable responses were received from
571 agencies, a response rate of 69 percent. The response rate was
significantly higher for municipal agencies than for sheriff's departments.

Approximately one-fourth (27 percent) of the surveyed agencies had an
early warning system in 1999. One-half of these systems had been created
since 1994, and slightly more than one-third had been created since 1996.
These data, combined with the number of agencies indicating that a
system was being planned (another 12 percent), suggest that such systems
will spread rapidly in the next few years.

Early warning systems are more prevalent among municipal law
enforcement agencies than among county sheriffs' departments.

How does an early warning system work?

Early warning systems have three basic phases: selection, intervention,
and postintervention monitoring. 

Selecting officers for the program. No standards have been established 
for identifying officers for early warning programs, but there is general
agreement about the criteria that should influence their selection.
Performance indicators that can help identify officers with problematic
behavior include citizen complaints, firearm-discharge and use-of-force
reports, civil litigation, resisting-arrest incidents, and high-speed pursuits
and vehicular damage.[6]

Although a few departments rely only on citizen complaints to select
officers for intervention, most use a combination of performance
indicators. Among systems that factor in citizen complaints, most (67
percent) require three complaints in a given timeframe (76 percent specify
a 12-month period) to identify an officer.

Intervening with the officer. The primary goal of early warning systems is
to change the behavior of individual officers who have been identified as
having problematic performance records. The basic intervention strategy
involves a combination of deterrence and education. The theory of simple
deterrence assumes that officers who are subject to intervention will
change their behavior in response to a perceived threat of punishment.[7]
General deterrence assumes that officers not subject to the system will also
change their behavior to avoid potential punishment. Early warning
systems also operate on the assumption that training, as part of the
intervention, can help officers improve their performance.

In most systems (62 percent), the initial intervention generally consists of
a review by the officer's immediate supervisor. Almost half of the
responding agencies (45 percent) involve other command officers in
counseling the officer. Also, these systems frequently include a training
class for groups of officers identified by the system (45 percent of survey
respondents).

Monitoring the officer's subsequent performance. Nearly all (90 percent)
the agencies that have an early warning system in place report that they
monitor an officer's performance after the initial intervention. Such
monitoring is generally informal and conducted by the officer's immediate
supervisor, but some departments have developed a formal process of
observation, evaluation, and reporting. Almost half of the agencies (47
percent) monitor the officer's performance for 36 months after the initial
intervention. Half of the agencies indicate that the followup period is not
specified and that officers are monitored either continuously or on a
case-by-case basis.

Limitations of the survey findings

The responses from the national survey should be viewed with some
caution. Some law enforcement agencies may have claimed to have an
early warning system when such a system is not actually functioning.
Several police departments created systems in the 1970s, but none of those
appears to have survived as a permanent program.[8]

Findings from three case studies

The research strategy for the case studies was modeled after the birth
cohort study of juvenile delinquency conducted by Wolfgang and
colleagues.[9] They found that a small group within the entire cohort (6.3
percent of the total) were "chronic delinquents" and were responsible for
half of all the serious crime committed by the entire cohort. The early
warning concept rests on the assumption that within any cohort of police
officers, a small percentage will have substantially worse performance
records than their peers and, consequently, will merit departmental
intervention. The research was designed to confirm or refute the
assumption.

Three police departments were chosen for the case study investigation:
Miami-Dade County, Minneapolis, and New Orleans. The three sites
represent large urban areas, but the size of each police force varies
considerably: At the time of the study, Miami-Dade had 2,920 sworn
officers, New Orleans had 1,576 sworn officers, and Minneapolis had 890
sworn officers.

The three sites were chosen for several reasons. Each has an early warning
system that had been operating for at least 4 years at the time of the study.
Also, the three systems differ from one another in terms of structure and
administrative history, and the three departments differ in their history 
of police officer use of force and accountability (see "Three cities, three
stories").

One goal of the case studies was to evaluate the impact of early warning
systems on the officers involved. In New Orleans, citizen complaints
about officers in the early warning program were analyzed for 2-year
periods before and after the initial intervention. Officers subject to early
warning intervention participate in a Professional Performance
Enhancement Program (PPEP) class; their critiques of the class were
analyzed and a 2-day class was observed to determine both the content of
the intervention and officer responses to various components.

Demographic and performance data were collected in Miami-Dade and
Minneapolis on a cohort of all officers hired in certain years--whether or
not they were identified by the early warning systems. The performance
data included citizen complaints, use-of-force reports, reprimands,
suspensions, terminations, commendations, and promotions. Other data
were collected as available in each site.

These records were sorted into two groups: officers identified by the early
warning system and officers not identified, with the latter serving as a
control group. The performance records of the early warning group were
analyzed for the 2-year periods before and after the intervention to
determine the impact of the intervention on the officers' behavior. The
analysis controlled for assignment to patrol duty on the assumption that
citizen complaints and use-of-force incidents are infrequently generated in
other assignments.

Characteristics of officers identified by early warning systems.
Demographically, officers identified by the systems do not differ
significantly from the control group in terms of race or ethnicity. Males,
are somewhat overrepresented and females are underrepresented. One
disturbing finding was a slight tendency of early warning officers to be
promoted at higher rates than control officers. This issue should be the
subject of future research, which should attempt to identify more precisely
whether some departments tend to reward through promotion the kind of
active (and possibly aggressive) behavior that is likely to cause officers to
be identified by an early warning system.

The impact of early warning systems on officers' performance. Early
warning systems appear to have a dramatic effect on reducing citizen
complaints and other indicators of problematic police performance among
those officers subject to intervention. In Minneapolis, the average number
of citizen complaints received by officers subject to early intervention
dropped by 67 percent 1 year after the intervention. In New Orleans, that
number dropped by 62 percent 1 year after intervention (exhibit 1). In
Miami-Dade, only 4 percent of the early warning cohort had zero
use-of-force reports prior to intervention; following intervention, 50
percent had zero use-of-force reports.

Data from New Orleans indicate that officers respond positively to early
warning intervention. In anonymous evaluations of the PPEP classes, 
officers gave it an average rating of 7 on a scale of 1 to 10. All of the
officers made at least one positive comment about the class, and some
made specific comments about how it had helped them. Officers in the
PPEP class that was directly observed were actively engaged in those
components they perceived to be related to the practical problems of
police work, particularly incidents that often generate complaints or other
problems. Officers were disengaged, however, in components that they
perceived to be abstract, moralistic, or otherwise unrelated to practical
aspects of police work.

This study could not determine the most effective aspects of intervention
(e.g., counseling regarding personal issues, training in specific law
enforcement techniques, stern warning about possible discipline in the
future) or whether certain aspects are more effective for certain types of
officers.

The impact of early warning systems on supervisors. The original design
of this study did not include evaluating the impact of these systems on
supervisors. Nonetheless, the qualitative component of the research found
that these systems have potentially significant effects on supervisors. The
existence of an intervention system communicates to supervisors their
responsibility to monitor officers who have been identified by the
program. The New Orleans program requires supervisors to monitor
identified officers under their command for 6 months and to complete
signed evaluations of the officers' performance every 2 weeks. Officials in
Miami-Dade think that their system helps ensure that supervisors will
attend to potential problem officers under their command. In this respect,
the systems mandate or encourage changes in supervisor behavior that
could potentially affect the standards of supervision of all officers, not just
those subject to early intervention. Furthermore, the system's database can
give supervisors relevant information about officers newly assigned to
them and about whom they know very little. 

The impact of early warning systems on the rest of the department. The
original design of this study did not include evaluating the impact of these
systems on the departments in which they operate. Nonetheless, the
qualitative component identified a number of important issues for future
research. The extent to which a system changes the climate of
accountability within a law enforcement agency is not known, and
identifying it would require a sophisticated research design. The
qualitative findings suggest that an effective early intervention program
depends on a general commitment to accountability within an
organization. Such a program is unlikely to create or foster a climate of
accountability where that commitment does not already exist. 

The data developed as a part of an early warning system can be used to
effect changes in policies, procedures, or training. Presumably, such
changes help reduce existing problems and help the department maintain
and raise its standards of accountability. Thus, these systems can be an
important tool for organizational development and human resource
management.[10]

The nature of early warning systems. A second goal of the case studies
was to describe the systems themselves. In all three sites, qualitative data
gathered from official documents and interviews with key stake-holders
yielded a description and assessment of the formal structure and
administrative history of each program, along with an assessment of its
place in the larger processes of accountability in the department.

In addition to finding that the early warning systems in the three sites vary
considerably in terms of their formal program elements, the study
documented that an effective system requires considerable investment of
resources and administrative attention. Miami-Dade's program, for
example, is part of a sophisticated data system on officers and their
performance. The New Orleans program involves several staff members,
including one full-time data analyst and two other full-time employees
who spend part of their time entering data.

Early warning systems should not be considered alarm clocks--they are not
mechanical devices that can be programmed to automatically sound an
alarm. Rather, they are extremely complex, high-maintenance
administrative operations that require close and ongoing human attention.
Without this attention, the systems are likely to falter or fail.

Limitations of the case study findings. The findings regarding the impact
of early warning intervention should be viewed with caution. As the
first-ever study of such systems, this project encountered a number of
unanticipated problems with the data. First, it was not possible to collect
retrospectively systematic data on positive police officer performance
(e.g., incidents when an officer avoided using force or citizens felt they
had been treated fairly and respectfully). Thus, it is not known whether
early intervention had a deterrent effect on desirable officer behavior.

Second, the early warning systems in each site studied operate in the
context of a larger commitment to increased accountability on the part of
the police department. Given the original research design, it is impossible
to disentangle the effect of this general climate of rising standards of
accountability on officer performance from the effect of the intervention
program itself.

Finally, the early warning systems in two of the three sites experienced
significant changes during the years for which data were collected. Thus, 
the intervention delivered was not consistent for the period studied.
Significant changes also occurred in two sites immediately following the
data collection period. In one instance, the system was substantially
strengthened. In the other, it is likely that the administration of the system
has deteriorated significantly; this deterioration may have begun during
the study, affecting the data that were collected.

Policing strategies and legal considerations

Early warning systems and policing strategies. These intervention
strategies are compatible with both community-oriented and
problem-oriented policing. Community-oriented policing seeks to
establish closer relations between the police and the communities they
serve. Insofar as the systems seek to reduce citizen complaints and other
forms of problematic behavior, they are fully consistent with these
goals.[11]

Problem-oriented policing focuses on identifying specific police problems
and developing carefully tailored responses.[12] Early warning systems
approach the problem officer as the concern to be addressed, and the 
intervention is the response tailored to change the behavior that leads to
indicators of unsatisfactory performance.

Early warning systems and traffic-stop data. The issue of racial profiling
by police has recently emerged as a national controversy. In response to
this controversy, a number of law enforcement agencies have begun to
collect data on the race and ethnicity of drivers stopped by their officers.

An officer who makes a disproportionate number of traffic stops of racial
or ethnic minorities (relative to other officers with the same assignment)
may be a problem officer who warrants the attention of the department.
Traffic-stop information can be readily incorporated into the database and
used to identify possible racial disparities (as well as other potential
problems, such as disproportionate stops of female drivers or unacceptably
low levels of activity).

Legal considerations of these systems. Some law enforcement agencies
may resist creating an early warning system for fear that a plaintiff's
attorney may subpoena the database's information on officer misconduct
and use that information against the agency in lawsuits alleging excessive
use of force.[13] Several experts argue, however, that in the current legal
environment, an early warning system is more likely to shield an agency
against liability for deliberate indifference regarding police use of force.
Such a system demonstrates that the agency has a clear policy regarding
misconduct, has made a good faith effort to identify employees whose
performance is unsatisfactory, and has a program in place to correct that
behavior.[14]

Policy concerns and areas for further research

Each of an early warning system's three phases involves a number of
complex policy issues. 

Selection. Although the selection criteria for most early warning systems
consider a range of performance indicators, some rely solely on citizen
complaints. A number of problems related to official data on citizen
complaints, including underreporting, have been documented.[15] Using a
broader range of indicators is more likely to identify officers whose
behavior requires departmental intervention.

Intervention. In most early warning systems, intervention consists of an
informal counseling session between the officer and his or her immediate
supervisor. Some systems require no documentation of the content of that
session, which raises concerns about whether supervisors deliver the
intended content of the intervention. It is possible that a supervisor may
minimize the importance of the intervention by telling an officer "not to
worry about it," thus reinforcing the officer's behavior. Involving higher
ranking command officers is likely to ensure that the intervention serves
the intended goals. Further research is needed on the most effective forms
of intervention and whether it is possible to tailor certain forms of
intervention to particular categories of officers. 

Postintervention monitoring. The nature of postintervention monitoring
varies among systems. Some systems rely on informal monitoring of the 
subject officers; others employ a formal mechanism of observation and
documentation by supervisors. The relative impact of different
postintervention monitoring systems on individual officers, supervisors,
and departments requires further research.

One tool among many

Early warning systems have emerged as a popular remedy for police
misconduct. This study suggests that these systems can reduce citizen
complaints and other problematic police behavior. Officers in the three
departments investigated as case studies were involved in substantially
fewer citizen complaints and use-of-force incidents after the intervention
than before. In these three departments, however, the systems were part of
larger efforts to raise standards of accountability. The effectiveness of such
a system is reinforced by (and probably dependent on) other policies and
procedures that enforce standards of discipline and create a climate of
accountability. 

An effective early warning system is a complex, high-maintenance
operation that requires a significant investment of administrative
resources. Some systems appear to be essentially symbolic gestures with
little substantive content, and it is unlikely that an intervention program
can be effective in a law enforcement agency that has no serious
commitment to accountability. It can be an effective management tool, but
it should be seen as only one of many tools needed to raise standards of
performance and improve the quality of police services.

Notes

1. "Kansas City Police Go After Their 'Bad Boys,'" New York Time,
September 10, 1991; and "Waves of Abuse Laid to a Few Officers,"
Boston Globe, October 4, 1992.

2. Herman Goldstein, Policing a Free Society, Cambridge, MA: Ballinger,
1977: 171.

3. Who is Guarding the Guardians? Washington, DC: U.S. Commission on
Civil Rights, 1981: 81. 

4. Kappeler, Victor, Richard Sluder, and Geoffrey Alpert, Forces of
Deviance: Understanding the Dark Side of Policing, Prospect Heights, IL:
Waveland Press, 1998.

5. The first wave of the survey occurred in August 1998, with a second
wave in October 1998 and followup in February 1999.

6. For discussions of recommended performance categories, see
International Association of Chiefs of Police, Building Integrity and
Reducing Drug Corruption in Police Departments, Washington, DC: U.S.
Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance, 1989: 80; and Reiter,
Lou, Law Enforcement Administrative Investigations: A Manual Guide,
2nd ed., Tallahassee, FL: Lou Reiter and Associates, 1998: 18.2.

7. Zimring, Franklin, and Gordon Hawkins, Deterrence, Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1973.

8. Milton, Catherine H., Jeanne Wahl Halleck, James Lardner, and Gary L.
Albrecht, Police Use of Deadly Force, Washington: The Police
Foundation, 1977: 94-110.

9. Wolfgang, Marvin E., Robert M. Figlio, and Thorsten Sellin,
Delinquency in a Birth Cohort, Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1972.

10. Mathis, Robert L., and John H. Jackson, eds., Human Resource
Management: Essential Perspectives, Cincinnati: Southwestern College
Publishing, 1999: 98-102; and Poole, Michael, and Malcolm Warner, The
IEBM Handbook of Human Resource Management, London:
Inter-national Thomson Business Press, 1998: 93.

11. Alpert, Geoffrey, and Mark H. Moore, "Measuring Performance in the
New Paradigm of Policing," in Performance Measures for the Criminal
Justice System, Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of
Justice Statistics, 1993: 109-142.

12. Eck, John E., and William Spelman, Problem-Solving:
Problem-Oriented Policing in Newport News, Washington, DC: U.S.
Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, 1987.

13. Reiter, Lou, Law Enforcement Administrative Investigations, chapter
18.

14. Gallagher, G. Patrick, "The Liability Shield: From Policy to Internal
Affairs," in Reiter, Lou, Law Enforcement Administrative Investigations,
chapter 20; and Beh, Hazel Glenn, "Municipal Liability for Failure To
Investigate Citizen Complaints Against Police," Fordham Urban Law
Journal XXV (2) 1998: 209-254.

15. Walker, Samuel, Police Accountability: The Role of Citizen Oversight,
Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Thompson, 2001.

------------------------------

Issues and Findings

Discussed in this Brief: A systematic study of early warning systems
designed to identify officers who may be having problems on the job and
to provide those officers with the appropriate counseling or training. The
findings are based on a survey of 832 local law enforcement agencies and
site visits to three departments with established early warning systems.

Key issues: A growing body of evidence indicates that in any police
department a small percentage of officers are responsible for a
disproportionate share of citizen complaints. Early warning systems help
supervisors identify these officers, intervene with them, and monitor their
subsequent performance.

Even though early warning systems are becoming more popular among
law enforcement agencies, little research has addressed the effectiveness
of such programs. This Brief reports on a study that establishes a baseline
description of early warning system programs and asks some fundamental
questions:

 o Are early warning systems effective in reducing police officer
misconduct?

 o Are some types of early warning systems more effective than others?

 o What impact do early warning systems have on the departments in
which they operate?

 o Do early warning systems have unintended and undesirable effects?

Key findings: Twenty-seven percent of local law enforcement agencies
serving populations of at least 50,000 had an early warning system in
1999; another 12 percent were planning to establish such a program.

Larger agencies were more likely than smaller agencies to use an early
warning system. Among agencies with 1,000 or more sworn officers, 79
percent had or planned to have an early warning system; only 56 percent
of agencies with between 500 and 999 sworn officers had or planned to
have such a program. 

No standards have been established for identifying which officers should
participate in early warning programs, but there is general agreement that a
number of factors can help identify problem officers: citizen complaints,
firearm-discharge reports, use-of-force reports, civil litigation,
resisting-arrest incidents, and pursuits and vehicular accidents.

Data from the three case-study agencies (in Miami, Minneapolis, and New
Orleans) indicate the following:

 o In spite of considerable differences among the programs, each program
appeared to reduce problem behaviors significantly.

 o Early warning systems encourage changes in the behavior of
supervisors, as well as of the identified officers.

 o Early warning systems are high-maintenance programs that require
ongoing administrative attention.

A caveat is in order about the findings reported here. The research design
was limited in a number of ways, and each of the early warning systems
studied operates in the context of a department's larger commitment to
increased accountability. It is impossible to disentangle the effect of the
department's culture of accountability from that of the early warning
program.

Target audience: State and local law enforcement administrators, planners,
and policymakers; researchers; and educators.

------------------------------

Three cities, three stories

The three early warning systems in the sites selected for the case studies
have different administrative histories and program structures, and the
three police departments have different histories with regard to police
officer use of force and accountability.

Miami-Dade County. The Miami-Dade Police Department (MDPD)
currently enjoys a reputation for high standards of professionalism and
accountability to reforms instituted following controversial racial incidents
in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

As a result of the real and perceived problems between police and citizens,
the Dade County Commission enacted legislation that opened to the public
the internal investigations conducted by MDPD. In addition, an employee
profile system (EPS) was created to track all complaints, use-of-force
incidents, commendations, disciplinary actions, and dispositions of all
internal investigations. As an offshoot of the EPS, MDPD created the
Early Identification System (EIS) under the supervision of the Internal
Review Bureau. 

MDPD's EIS began operating in 1981. Quarterly reports list all officers
who receive two or more citizen complaints that were investigated and
closed or who were involved in three or more use-of-force incidents
during the previous 3 months. Annual reports list officers who were
identified in two or more quarterly reports. Monthly reports list employees
who received two or more complaints during the previous 60 days,
regardless of disposition.

The reports are disseminated through the chain of command to the
supervisors of each officer identified. As one official described the system,
supervisors use the reports "as a resource to determine if job stress or
performance problems exist."[a] The information is intended to help
supervisors evaluate and guide an employee's job performance and
conduct in conjunction with other information.

The intervention phase of EIS consists primarily of an informal counseling
session between the supervisor and the officer. The supervisor is expected
to discuss the report with the officer and determine whether further action
is needed. Such actions may include making referrals to employee
assistance programs inside or outside the department, such as
psychological services, stress abatement programs, or specialized training
programs. 

Postintervention monitoring of officers in the early warning system is
informal and conducted by supervisors. Review of officers' performance
records is designed to identify officers who continue to exhibit patterns of
misconduct and to make the officers aware that their performance is being
closely scrutinized. Additionally, the program puts supervisors on notice
that their responsibilities include the close monitoring of those whose
performance is problematic.

Minneapolis. When the study began, the Minneapolis Police Department
(MPD) had a mixed reputation and was in transition under the leadership
of a relatively new chief. MPD has long had a national reputation as a
police department receptive to research. At the same time, however, MPD
had a troubled local reputation with respect to the use of force by its
officers. This reputation eventually brought a number of important
political and administrative changes in the 1990s. The mayor declined to
reappoint the incumbent police chief, who had failed to discipline the
police officers. The new police chief began raising standards of
accountability; among other reforms, he instituted a version of the
COMPSTAT process. These changes have had direct implications for the
system of accountability within the MPD and complicate any attempt to
evaluate the impact of MPD's early warning system.

The program was established in the early 1990s and has undergone a
number of significant administrative changes, including a period of
slightly more than 1 year in the mid-1990s when the system ceased
functioning altogether. After the data collection period for this study, a
new procedure was instituted that calls for reviewing all reports of
potentially problematic officer performance every 2 weeks. This procedure
substantially heightens the intensity of the level of supervision. Thus, the
findings reported here do not reflect current practices in the department.

The only selection criterion for the system is citizen complaints. The
formal selection criteria have changed over the years, however. Currently,
a quarterly report lists all officers with two or more citizen complaints,
whether sustained or unsustained.

The intervention phase in Minneapolis consists of only an informal
counseling session between the officer and his or her immediate
supervisor. In the early years, supervisors were required to document their
counseling session in the form of a memorandum to the commander.
There is currently no documentation requirement, and MPD's program
does not include any formal postintervention monitoring. Apart from the
routine supervision applied to all officers, officers who are subject to
intervention are not subject to formal monitoring and no special data are
collected on their performance.

New Orleans. In the mid-1990s, the New Orleans Police Department
(NOPD) had a national reputation for both corruption and use of force by
its officers. Between 1995 and 1998, NOPD terminated an average of
slightly more than 18 officers per year and imposed an average of more
than 100 suspensions per year. At the same time, 97 officers resigned or
retired while under investigation by the department and 105 officers were
either arrested or issued a citation for a criminal law violation. These are
extremely high figures compared with police departments of similar
size.[b]

The officials associated with NOPD's Professional Performance
Enhancement Program (PPEP) have a strong sense of identification with
the program and are committed to maintaining and improving it. The
department also conducts random integrity "stings" to identify possible
corrupt activities by officers. Furthermore, PPEP does not limit its focus to
individual officers, but also examines training, procedures, and
supervision."[c]

As in Minneapolis, changes in the program occurred after the data
collection period. It is likely that the administration of the program has
weakened somewhat, due largely to the retirement or departure of key
individuals. Thus, the findings reported here do not reflect current
practices in the department.

Officers are selected for the program on the basis of three categories of
performance indicators: incidents involving conflict in arrest and nonarrest
situations and referrals from supervisors. However, intervention is not
automatic; commanders review performance records and exercise
discretion in selecting officers.

The PPEP class consists of an overview and explanation of the program
and units on human behavior, stress management, conflict management,
complaint avoidance, sensitivity training, "extraneous contributors to
conflict" (such as substance abuse), and techniques and assessment (which
includes training related to such police activities as tactical stops, situation
assessment, handcuffing, and custodial security). Each class includes a
private counseling session with the instructor, during which the officer's
record is reviewed and the reasons for being selected for the program are
explained.

Immediate supervisors are required to monitor each officer for a period of
6 months after the intervention. During that period, the supervisor is
required to observe the officer interacting with citizens while on duty and
to complete a bi-weekly evaluation of the officer's performance.

a. Charette, Bernard, "Early Identification of Police Brutality and
Misconduct," Miami: Metro-Dade Police Department, n.d., p. 5.

b. "Disciplinary Action Breakdown," New Orleans Police Department,
February 9, 1999.

c. New Orleans Police Department, Public Integrity Division, "To Whom
It May Concern," May 5, 1998.

------------------------------

This study was conducted by Samuel Walker, Ph.D., Professor, University
of Nebraska at Omaha; Geoffrey P. Alpert, Ph.D., Washington State
University; and Dennis J. Kenney, Ph.D., Rutgers University. Support for
the study was provided by NIJ grant number 98-IJ-CX-0002 through a
transfer of funds from the Office of Community Oriented Policing
Services. 

Findings and conclusions of the research reported here are those of the
authors and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the
U.S. Department of Justice. 

The National Institute of Justice is a component of the Office of Justice
Programs, which also includes the Bureau of Justice Assistance, the
Bureau of Justice Statistics, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency
Prevention, and the Office for Victims of Crime.

This and other NIJ publications can be found at and downloaded from the
NIJ Web site (http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij).

NCJ 188565