Police officers are highly trained.
There are many specialist divisions – dive squad, search and rescue, motorcycle squad, diplomatic protection squad, criminal investigation bureau, armed offenders squad.
Each division has its own uniform.
When people join the police they start off as probationary constables and they have a Field Training Officer with them for 2 years to help them learn how to be a great police officer.
Police officers are here to help people in all sorts of situations. New officers have to learn everything - from filling out the right forms, to doing a traffic stop properly, through to working a crime scene. The Police deal with all of these different things as part of their everyday job.
Once they have been a Probationary Constable for 2 years they don’t need a Field Training officer any longer because they know what it takes to be a great police officer.
Regular police officers wear a uniform too, so that people know who can help them. And they have badges of rank on them so that police officers can tell who is in charge. Look at the epaulettes on their shoulders when you next see police officers.
Constables have a plain blue epaulette. Sergeants have 3 stripes, senior sergeants have a crown and a wreath on their epaulettes, inspectors have 3 Stars and superintendents have 1 star and a crown
As you become more senior in rank, you have more responsibility – you’re in charge of more people in the Police force.
Did you know :
Constable Bryan joined the police 12 years ago (there weren’t such things as emails then and the police still had wooden batons too :0)
Police officers make up the most of the New Zealand Police force, but there are lots of non-uniformed staff and volunteers who provide support to officers and without them a Police officer’s job would be even harder.
The complete rank system in the police works like this,so look at police officers epaulettes and you will know what they are :
Recruit — word "RECRUIT" below police number
Constable — police number
Senior Constable — one white point-up chevron above police number
Sergeant — three white point-up chevrons above police number
Senior Sergeant — white crown between two ferns above police number
Inspector — three silver stars ("pips")
Superintendent — one silver star below a crown
Assistant Commissioner — three silver pips in a triangle below a crown
Deputy Commissioner — silver crossed sword and baton below one star
Commissioner — silver crossed sword and baton below a crown.
You can’t just join the police and become a detective you must still learn how to be a frontline officer first...so expect that if you want to become a detective that it will take you about 4-6 years of training.
The check patterns (livery) on the side of Police cars is called ‘Battenburg Markings’ and is named after a battenburg cake which has the same markings
The Royal New Zealand Police college was opened by HRH Prince Charles on April 1, 1981 up until then some training had been done at Trentham Miltary base.
If you want to find out more about becoming a Police officer or what Police officers do go to: www.newcops.co.nz
Police provide services 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. They operate from more than 400 community-based police stations and have over 10,300 staff members in New Zealand
Police go to more than 600,000 111 calls each year.
The Police officers below are the Police Officers who have been killed in the line of duty In New Zealand and made the ultimate sacrifice in keeping us ALL safe :
2002 Duncan Taylor
1999 Lester Stretch
1996 Glenn McKibben
1990 Stewart Guthrie
1990 Peter Umbers
1986 Robin Dudding
1977 Barry Gibson
1976 Peter Murphy
1970 Gilbert Arcus
1966 Donald Stokes
1963 Brian Schultz
1963 James Richardson
1963 Neville Power
1963 Wallace Chalmers
1951 William Hughes
1949 John Kehoe
1941 Edward Best
1941 Percy Tulloch
1941 Frederick Jordan
1941 William Cooper
1934 Thomas Heeps
1921 James Dorgan
1919 Vivian Dudding
1913 John Doyle
1910 John McGuire
1890 Neil McLeod