French National Police - Definition and Overview

The National Police (Police Nationale) is the main civil law enforcement agency of France, with primary jurisdiction in cities and large towns. The other main agency is the military Gendarmerie, with primary jurisdiction in smaller towns and rural and border areas. The National Police comes under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of the Interior and has about 150,000 employees.

The National Police and the Gendarmerie have sole competency for arresting suspects, serving search warrants, and conducting enquiries (under the supervision of the judiciary). In some cases, customs officers may also have those competencies.

The powers of making a full arrest, hearing suspects, overseeing searches, etc. are restricted to members of the police or the gendarmerie with the qualification of "officer of judiciary police" (officier de police judiciaire), which includes all commissioned and non-commissioned officers of the Gendarmerie and commissaires (superintendents) and inspecteurs (detective inspectors) of the National Police. Lower ranking officers are only "agents of judiciary police" (agents de police judiciaire) and have only limited competences.

Local police forces operated by communes (cities and towns) and rural areas (garde champêtres), do not have many legal powers beyond traffic law enforcement and the normal citizen's arrest power that all persons have. Whether or not they should be allowed to carry firearms is a disputed issue.

Organization

The police is divided into directorates [1] (http://www.interieur.gouv.fr/rubriques/c/c3_police_nationale/c33_organisation):

• Direction de l'administration de la police nationale (Directorate of Administration of the National Police; DAPN)
• Direction de la formation de police nationale (Directorate of Training of the National Police; DFPN)
• Direction centrale de la police judiciaire (Central Directorate of Judicial Police; DCPJ) - criminal investigation (known as "36 Quai des Orfèvres")
• Direction centrale de la sécurité publique (Central Directorate of Public Security; DCSP) - uniformed patrol and response
• Direction de la surveillance du territoire (Directorate of Territorial Surveillance; DST) - counter-intelligence
• Direction centrale de la police aux frontières (Central Directorate of Border Police; DCPAF)
• Direction centrale des renseignements généraux (Central Directorate of General Information; DCRG) - records
• Inspection générale de la police nationale (Inspectorate General of the National Police; IPGN) - internal affairs
• Direction centrale des compagnies républicaines de sécurité (Central Directorate of the Republican Security Companies; DCCRS) - riot police
• Service de coopération technique internationale de police (Technical International Police Co-operation Service; SCTIP)
• Service de protection des hautes personnalités (Important Persons Protection Service; SPHP)

Security in the Paris area is the domain of the Paris Prefecture of Police .

See also

• Police in France
• Préfecture
• National police

External links

• Police Nationale (http://www.interieur.gouv.fr/rubriques/c/c3_police_nationale) (in French)
• Police Nationale (http://www.interieur.gouv.fr/rubriques/divers/anglais/dgpn) (in English)