August Vollmer (March 7, 1876 – November 4, 1955) was the first police chief of Berkeley, California, and a leading figure in the development of the field of criminal justice in the United States in the early 20th century.

He supported his mother and the rest of his family as a partner in Patterson and Vollmer, a hay, grain, wood and coal supply store, at the corner of Shattuck Avenue and Vine Street near a fire station north of downtown Berkeley.

In 1898, August enlisted in the Eighth Corps of the United States Army,[3] fighting in numerous engagements in the Spanish–American War in the Philippines as well as taking part in occupation duties following the close of formal combat.

Drawing on his military experience, and his own research, Vollmer reorganized the Berkeley police force.

Vollmer had discovered that very little literature existed in the United States on the subject of police work, so he located and read a number of European works on the subject, in particular, Criminal Psychology, by Hans Gross, an Austrian criminologist, and Memoirs of Vidocq, by Eugène François Vidocq, head of the detective division of the French police in Paris.

He established a bicycle patrol and created the first centralized police records system, designed to streamline and organize criminal investigations.

In the ensuing years, Vollmer's reputation as the "father of modern law enforcement" grew.

[4] He was the first chief to require that police officers attain college degrees, and persuaded the University of California to teach criminal justice.

[1] Vollmer was also the first police chief to create a motorized force, placing officers on motorcycles and in cars so that they could patrol a broader area with greater efficiency.

Vollmer supported programs to assist disadvantaged children, and was often criticized for his leniency towards petty offenders such as drunks and loiterers.

Other portions of the Wickersham report were sharply critical of current police practice; one of the volumes was entitled Lawlessness in Law Enforcement.

He was then appointed as a professor of police administration in the Political Science Department at the University of California, and went on to found its School of Criminology.