Police commissioner
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Police Commissioner (or Commissioner of Police) is the title of the chief officer of many law enforcement agencies. In some organizations, the commissioner is a political appointee, and may or may not actually be a professional police officer. In these circumstances, there is often a professional chief of police in charge of day-to-day operations. Usually, however, the commissioner is the professional head of the organization.
In some U.S. states, the sheriff fills the same function as a police commissioner. For example in Las Vegas, Nevada the elected county sheriff heads a combined county-municipal Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. The agency was created via a merger of the Sheriff's Office and the former municipal Police Department.
In the police of France and other French-speaking countries, Commissaire (Commissioner) is a lower rank equating approximately to the British police rank of Superintendent.
In the Romanian Police, similarly to the French Police, the rank of Comisar is equivalent to the British police rank of Superintendent (see also Romanian Police#Ranks).
[edit] Popular Culture
- A famous fictional commissioner is Commissioner James Gordon, ally of Batman.
- Pierre Niémans, played by Jean Reno, in the movie Crimson Rivers (Les Rivières Pourpres) is a Police Commissioner (Commissaire). However, in the novel, he is a Superintendent.
- Stewart McMillan (Rock Hudson) was the police commissioner for the City of San Francisco in the NBC television network’s crime drama, McMillan and Wife.
- Abe Carver, television's longest running African-American character, is the Police Commissioner of the town of Salem in Days of our Lives
