Cuo: Don’t let bad cops get rehired

Gov. Cuomo on Sunday said he wants to close a loophole that allows cops accused of misconduct in one police department to get a new job at a different department.

In a conference call with reporters, Cuomo said, “People have to know that a police officer who breaks the rules and abuses his or her position, is no longer going to be a police officer and there can’t be these bureaucratic contrivances and loopholes.”

Cuomo said he would be “making proposals” to address the issue, but he did not give specifics.

He cited a report from the Albany Times Union about an East Greenbush officer who was allowed to keep his law-enforcement certification after he resigned amid allegations that he made inappropriate sexual advances toward women he met while on duty.

Officer Matthew C. Wyld was accused of having sex with a woman in his patrol car hours after he arrested her for shoplifting, and making advances on Facebook toward a 17-year-old girl he encountered during a traffic stop. Wyld, 33, was suspended Aug. 10, 2017, and resigned six days later.

However, after the local police union complained it was improper to ask for Wyld’s decertification because he’d never been served with a formal notice of discipline, the department rescinded a request it had made with the state Division of Criminal Justice Services to pull Wyld’s police certification.

He then applied for at least four other jobs in law enforcement, but appears not to have been hired, the Times Union reported.