Polícia Judiciária


The Polícia Judiciária is the national criminal investigation police agency of Portugal, focused in fighting serious crimes, including homicides, kidnapping, organized crime, terrorism, illegal drug trade, corruption, cybercrime and financial crime. It is integrated into the Ministry of Justice, but operates under the supervision of the Public Ministry.
Several countries and territories that were once overseas provinces of Portugal maintain criminal investigation police forces modeled after the Portuguese one, with some of them retaining also the name Polícia Judiciária. These are the cases of Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau and Macau.
The Polícia Judiciária Militar is a separate criminal investigation police agency that operates under the Ministry of National Defense. This agency is responsible for the investigation of military crimes and crimes committed among the Portuguese Armed Forces.

History

The present Polícia Judiciária originates from a division of the old Polícia Civil. The Polícia Civil was founded on 2 July 1867, during the reign of Luís I of Portugal and changed its name to Polícia Cívica in 1910. By decree of 29 August 1893, the Polícia de Investigação Judiciária e Preventiva branch of the Polícia Civil was created. In 1922, this branch became the Polícia de Investigação Criminal. In 1927, it became an autonomous police service under the Ministry of Justice. On 20 October 1945, the PIC changed its name to Polícia Judiciária.

Organization

The Polícia Judiciária is headed by a National Director, appointed together by the Prime-Minister and the Minister of Justice.
Under the National Director, the PJ includes the following organic units:
The Polícia Judiciária is officially responsible for criminal investigation and evidence collection. In addition to this, almost all homicides in Portuguese territory are handled by the PJ. The crime fighting work performed by the Polícia Judiciária is regularly shown in the Portuguese media. Major drug trafficking combat operations are often reported in the main Portuguese television networks and other media, as well as the dismantling of organized crime groups linked with terrorism, corruption, fraud, burglary, robbery, forgery and other crimes. In the 2000s, the Polícia Judiciária had a rate of success of 77.43% in finding missing children, including abductions and runaway children. In 2009 alone, PJ had a 100% success rate in finding missing children. The same happened in 2010.

Equipment

Although the Polícia Judiciária can use virtually any weapons of any caliber if necessary, they are issued with the Glock 19 as their standard firearm - like their Polícia de Segurança Pública and Guarda Nacional Republicana counterparts - with the Glock 26 used by mainly female agents.