Meet the rest of the family

You’ve already seen your neighbourhood policing teams. These teams are based locally and make communities safer and stronger by focusing on community resilience, early intervention, crime reduction and prevention.

There are two more teams based locally across the force area keeping you safe.

Response and Patrol

Specially trained officers who race to emergencies and are the first on the scene. They attend live incidents to keep the public safe and arrest suspects of crime. 

Although they are based at local stations, they will be out and about proactively patrolling our communities. They will always be there when you really need them.

Criminal Investigation Department (CID)

Investigates serious and complex crimes to make sure offenders are brought to justice. They also predominately manage detainees in our custody that have been brought in by our response and patrol teams. 

They prepare evidence for the Crown Prosecution Service who decide whether a suspect is charged, which ultimately leads to criminals being taken off our streets.

Underneath the three teams that make up your local police family, we have force wide teams that support these on a daily basis.

Force Control Room

Often the first point of contact for you and they always prioritise the calls they get based on threat and risk to make sure that people are getting the help they need, when they need it. 

They prioritise where our response and patrol officers go and protect the most vulnerable in our society. They not only answer our 999 calls but our non-emergency 101 calls too. Teams will assess non-emergency calls and arrange deployment, resources and appointments to make sure these people are getting the help they need.

Special Operations Unit

Supporting some of the most serious crime with a very specialist set of skills. Our firearms officers perform armed reassurance patrols, attend firearms incidents and often attend scenes of serious injuries.

• Dog Unit officers and their furry friends support planned operations and assist in searching for criminals, victims and evidence.
• Roads policing teams attend and investigate the most serious road traffic collisions and deny criminals the use of our roads. This can include stopping organised criminals through County Lines operations as well as catching drivers who are under the influence of drink and drugs and pose a huge risk to other drivers.

Community Support Unit

Encourages and empowers local people to be part of the solution to the kinds of crime and disorder that negatively impacts on their neighbourhoods. They coordinate our approach to anti-social behaviour, manage adherence to licensing legislation so businesses are acting responsibly and support minority and vulnerable communities and our contact with them.

They also recruit and train our volunteers who support a number of activates across the force including role playing when we train new officers and attending community events.

We are also supported by a number of regional and national resources. These specialist areas might not be something we need every day, but when we do need them they are there for us.

Underwater Marine and Search Unit

Responsible for any policing task that takes place on or around water. This includes searching for evidence, conducting high visibility boat patrols and recovery.

Scientific Support Services

Using cutting-edge technology to examine forensic evidence collected at the scene of a crime, fatality or incident to help piece together what happened.

National Police Air Service

Provides 24/7 support from 14 national bases and help us to search for missing people, manage critical incidents and pursue vehicles. They attend incidents which pose the highest risk to communities across the country.