artful dodger, n.¹ — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

artful dodger n.¹

[the original Artful Dodger appears in Charles Dickens’s Oliver Twist (1838)]

(US Und.) a person who dodges the police by never sleeping in the same place twice.

1859		Matsell Vocabulum 9: Artful Dodgers [...] fellows who dare not sleep twice in the same place for fear of arrest.
1895		C. Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict 4: Artful Dodgers, [...] thieves who never sleep twice in the same place for fear of arrest.