--- description: Black male recruits account for 6.86% of this year's police academy class title: NYPD Chief: Recruiting Black Cops Is Hard Due to Criminal Histories image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt188f48404c27ffa2/698853cbf887dc7590e90da5/bill-bratton.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [U.S.](/section/us/) ## U.S. Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [police](/tag/police/) ## police Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # NYPD Chief: Recruiting Black Cops Is Hard Due to Criminal Histories by [Katy Osborn](/author/katy-osborn/) ## Katy Osborn Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jun 10, 2015 1:51 AM CUT  NEW YORK, NY - MAY 13: New York Police Department Commissioner Bill Bratton speaks at a press briefing after a hammer-wielding attacker assaulted a police officer on May 13, 2015 in New York City. The attacker was shot twice by a police officer and is currently in the hospital undergoing medical treatment. (Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images) NEW YORK, NY - MAY 13: New York Police Department Commissioner Bill Bratton speaks at a press briefing after a hammer-wielding attacker assaulted a police officer on May 13, 2015 in New York City. The attacker was shot twice by a police officer and is currently in the hospital undergoing medical treatment. (Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images)Andrew Burton—Getty Images by [Katy Osborn](/author/katy-osborn/) ## Katy Osborn Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Jun 10, 2015 1:51 AM CUT Bringing more diversity into New York City’s police force is a challenge, the city’s police commissioner said [recently](http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/09/bratton-hiring-black-nypd-officers-criminal-records "undefined"), claiming that criminal records of the would-be recruits get in the way. “We have a significant population gap among African American males because so many of them have spent time in jail,” Bill Bratton told the Guardian, “and, as such, we can’t hire them.” Black male recruits [account](http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/09/life-black-nypd-love-for-the-force "undefined") for 6.86% of this year’s police academy class, down even from 7.3% in 1970. Explaining why the pool of prospective officers lacked more non-white candidates, aside from already tense relations between minority communities and law enforcement in the wake of several high-profile police killings of unarmed black men, Bratton acknowledged the impact of the “stop-and-frisk” policy that a federal judge overturned in 2013, saying it overly targeted black and Latino men. [Read more at the Guardian.](http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/09/bratton-hiring-black-nypd-officers-criminal-records "undefined") ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3915122/bill-bratton-nypd-black-officer-recruits-crime/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3915122/bill-bratton-nypd-black-officer-recruits-crime/"},"headline":"NYPD Chief: Recruiting Black Cops Is Hard Due to Criminal Histories","datePublished":"2015-06-10T01:51:52.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T08:03:47.847Z","description":"Black male recruits account for 6.86% of this year's police academy class","url":"https://time.com/3915122/bill-bratton-nypd-black-officer-recruits-crime/","keywords":["police","Crime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt188f48404c27ffa2/698853cbf887dc7590e90da5/bill-bratton.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Katy Osborn","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/katy-osborn/"}],"articleSection":"U.S.","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt188f48404c27ffa2/698853cbf887dc7590e90da5/bill-bratton.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"New York Police Department Commissioner Bill Bratton speaks at a press briefing after a hammer-wielding attacker assaulted a police officer on May 13, 2015 in New York City.","caption":"New York Police Department Commissioner Bill Bratton speaks at a press briefing after a hammer-wielding attacker assaulted a police officer on May 13, 2015 in New York City.","creditText":"Andrew Burton—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/us/","name":"U.S."}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/police/","name":"police"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3915122/bill-bratton-nypd-black-officer-recruits-crime/","name":"NYPD Chief: Recruiting Black Cops Is Hard Due to Criminal Histories"}}]}] ```