The Central Directorate of the Judicial Police (French: Direction centrale de la police judiciaire; DCPJ) is a directorate of the National Police (French: Police nationale) of France with national and territorial competence for investigating and fighting serious crime.
Mission and responsibilities
The DCPJ is responsible for fighting serious crime nationwide, either with its central services that are of national competence (OCTRIS, OCLCO, SDAT, etc.) or through its regional directorates.
Its responsibilities and focus evolved over time. In 2009, were directly mentioned:
- Crimes against persons and properties
- Missing persons
- Arms trafficking
- Fugitives
- International fraud
- Prostitution
- Art trafficking
- Stolen vehicles and documents
- Terrorism
- Drug trafficking
- Money laundering
- White-collar crime
- Counterfeiting
- Cybercrime
Organisation
The DCPJ is itself divided into sub-directorates:
- The sous-direction de la lutte contre la criminalité organisée et la délinquance financière (SDLCODF) – Organised and financial crime sub-directorate.
- The sous-direction Anti-terroriste (SDAT) – Anti-terrorist sub-directorate.
- The sous-direction de la lutte contre la cybercriminalité – Cybercrime sub-directorater.
- The sous-direction de la police technique et scientifique (SDPTS) – Police Technical and Scientific sub-directorate.
- The sous-direction des ressources, de l'évaluation et de la stratégie (SDRES) – Resources, evaluations, and strategy sub-directorate.
But a major part of PJ in France is actually composed by territorial services (DIPJ/DRPJ).
It has a strength of 5,200 employees.
History
The first national judicial police was created in 1907 by Georges Clemenceau acting as Minister of the Interior, and Célestin Hennion. Before that, the police were local forces, and had trouble coping with new large gangs acting on broader areas, using cars and railways to move (while police had bicycle or horses). The 12 Brigades régionales de police mobile (Regional Brigades of Mobile Police), based in major cities with large jurisdictions, totaled 500 strong (which allowed 24/7 surveillance of suspects), well trained, used the Bertillon system, had telephones and quickly got cars. They got results, such as the arrest of the famous Bonnot Gang. "Le Tigre" (tiger) being the nickname of Georges Clemenceau, they got called Brigades du Tigre (Tiger Squad) and were featured in Les Brigades du Tigre. Nowadays the logo of the DCPJ figures a tiger and the silhouette of Clemenceau.