Law enforcement in Finland
Encyclopedia
Finland
Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
falls under the jurisdiction of the Finnish Police, a national police agency.
The Finnish Police is divided into 24 local departments and three national agencies. The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) is a national unit tasked with "crime prevention and
provision of expert services." The Finnish Security Intelligence Service "specializes in the prevention of security threats of the State." The third is the National Traffic Police.
Limited law enforcement authority is also given for specific reasons. In border zones and when dealing with arriving persons and goods, Finnish Border Guard
Finnish Border Guard
The Finnish Border guard is the national security agency responsible for enforcing the security of Finland's borders...
and Finnish Customs have police authority, respectively. Municipal parking inspectors, train conductors and ticket inspectors have limited police powers. The military has very limited police powers, mainly for internal investigation of military crimes and guarding military facilities. The Ministry of the Interior and a provincial offices may give police powers for a specific task and to the degree necessary.
National police agencies
National Bureau of Investigation, which is responsible for major criminal investigations and certain types of specialist services such as fingerprint recognition (Finnish: KeskusrikospoliisiKeskusrikospoliisi
Keskusrikospoliisi located in the city of Vantaa is a division of Finland's national police. Literally Keskusrikospoliisi/Centralkriminalpolisen would be translated as "Central Criminal Police", which might be a more descriptive name for the entity, as its primary mission is to fight against...
, KRP, Swedish: Centralkriminalpolisen, CKP). KRP was formed in 1954 to assist the country's other police elements in efforts against crime, particularly that of a serious or deeply rooted nature. A special concern of the KRP is white-collar crime
White-collar crime
Within the field of criminology, white-collar crime has been defined by Edwin Sutherland as "a crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of his occupation" . Sutherland was a proponent of Symbolic Interactionism, and believed that criminal behavior was...
. To carry out its mission, the force has advanced technical means at its disposal, and it maintains Finland's fingerprint and identification files. In addition to working with local police forces, the KRP operates independently throughout the country.
Finnish Security Intelligence Service, responsible for national security and the investigation of related crimes. (Finnish: Suojelupoliisi, SUPO, Swedish: Skyddspolisen (Skypo), literally: Protection Police)
National Traffic Police, a highway patrol
Highway patrol
A highway patrol is either a police unit created primarily for the purpose of overseeing and enforcing traffic safety compliance on roads and highways, or a detail within an existing local or regional police agency that is primarily concerned with such duties.Duties of highway patrols or traffic...
organization responsible for traffic safety, doubling as a national police reserve which can also be called as reinforcements for general law enforcement tasks (Finnish: Liikkuva poliisi, Swedish: Rörliga polisen, literally: Mobile police). Liikkuva poliisi, LP, was formed in 1930 to operate throughout the country to prevent smuggling, to control highway traffic, and, above all, to be ready at a moment's notice to assist local police forces in quelling civil disturbances. With a complement of 724, as of 1988, the LP had a department in each province and command units in larger communities. Its main functions, in addition to its responsibility for traffic regulation and vehicle inspection, are to prevent the illegal importation and the manufacture of alcohol and drugs, to enforce hunting and fishing regulations, and to assist other police units in investigations and in apprehension of fugitives.
Other nationally active formations
Karhu Team, equivalent to SWATSWAT
A SWAT team is an elite tactical unit in various national law enforcement departments. They are trained to perform high-risk operations that fall outside of the abilities of regular officers...
teams in the United States. Though it is situated in Helsinki City Police Department, Karhu team is a national police special unit that is used all around Finland.
In June 2008, the Finnish police established a Police Incident Response Team tasked with improving the prevention, detection and management of serious information security incidents.
Local police departments
The function of each district police department is to maintain general law and order, prevent crime, investigate crime and other events that threaten public order and safety, to carry out traffic control and surveillance and promote traffic safety, and perform all other duties prescribed by law or otherwise assigned to the police in their area. Local police also processes licenses and permits such as driving licenses, gun licenses, national ID cards and passports, and furthermore, enforces immigration decisions by the Finnish Immigration Service. Local police is must also be notified when organizing public events that may significantly influence local public security and traffic.There are 24 police departments in Finland, with 280 service points. Alarm services are operated by fifteen regional Emergency Response Centres managed by the Ministry of the Interior in cooperation with the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health.
Other agencies
CustomsCustoms
Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting and safeguarding customs duties and for controlling the flow of goods including animals, transports, personal effects and hazardous items in and out of a country...
and Border Guard
Finnish Border Guard
The Finnish Border guard is the national security agency responsible for enforcing the security of Finland's borders...
also perform some law enforcement functions, mainly concerned with goods (Customs) and persons (Border Guard) crossing Finland's borders. Within their fields of work, the Customs and Border Guard officers have most police powers. In the Customs, the power to arrest is delegated to the level of senior customs inspectors. In the Border Guard, the power to arrest is delegated to the level of border control detachments commander. The Customs may utilize all investigative police powers, with the exception of the use of deep-cover
Undercover
Being undercover is disguising one's own identity or using an assumed identity for the purposes of gaining the trust of an individual or organization to learn secret information or to gain the trust of targeted individuals in order to gain information or evidence...
personnel and sting operation
Sting operation
In law enforcement, a sting operation is a deceptive operation designed to catch a person committing a crime. A typical sting will have a law-enforcement officer or cooperative member of the public play a role as criminal partner or potential victim and go along with a suspect's actions to gather...
s. The Border Guard may use almost all investigative powers.
The Finnish Defence Forces
Finnish Defence Forces
The Finnish Defence Forces are responsible for the defence of Finland. It is a cadre army of 15,000, of which 8,900 are professional soldiers , extended with conscripts and reservists such that the standard readiness strength is 34,700 people in uniform...
have provost
Provost (military police)
Provosts are military police whose duties are policing solely within the Armed Forces, as opposed to Gendarmerie duties in the civilian population. However, many countries use their gendarmerie for provost duties....
duties and jurisdiction over guarding military installations. The Defence Forces also have the right to investigate all military crimes and most crimes committed by service-men against non-civilians. In addition, the Defence Forces have the right to conduct counter-espionage and counter-sabotage activities related to the national defence. However, Suojelupoliisi
Suojelupoliisi
The Finnish Security Intelligence Service is the intelligence agency of Finland in charge of national security. The agency's staff is composed of 220 policemen with additional training...
conducts actual criminal investigations of state-security-related crimes also within the Defence Forces. Military unit commanders have the jurisdiction over the investigations of minor infractions. The power to arrest is delegated to company commander level. More serious crimes are investigated, by the investigative section of the Finnish Defence Command or by the military attorneys of lower command levels. Security-related military police activities and all technical surveillance activities are carried out by the investigative section of the Defence Command. The Defence Forces do not have the right to conduct wiretaps or other forcible measures against Finnish civilian telecommunications.
Public Order Act
On October 1, 2003, the Public Order Act went into effect, standardizing public ordinances throughout the country.Equipment
- Glock 17
- Heckler & Koch MP5Heckler & Koch MP5The Heckler & Koch MP5 is a 9mm submachine gun of German design, developed in the 1960s by a team of engineers from the German small arms manufacturer Heckler & Koch GmbH of Oberndorf am Neckar....
- Heckler & Koch G36CHeckler & Koch G36The Heckler & Koch G36 is a 5.56×45mm assault rifle, designed in the early 1990s by Heckler & Koch in Germany as a replacement for the 7.62mm G3 battle rifle. It was accepted into service with the Bundeswehr in 1997, replacing the G3...
- Taser X26TaserA Taser is an electroshock weapon that uses electrical current to disrupt voluntary control of muscles. Its manufacturer, Taser International, calls the effects "neuromuscular incapacitation" and the devices' mechanism "Electro-Muscular Disruption technology"...
- Baton
- Pepper sprayPepper sprayPepper spray, also known as OC spray , OC gas, and capsicum spray, is a lachrymatory agent that is used in riot control, crowd control and personal self-defense, including defense against dogs and bears...
- TETRATetrathumb|right|250px|Pristella tetra — [[Pristella maxillaris]].thumb|right|250px|Golden Pristella tetra, a [[morph |morph]] of [[Pristella maxillaris]].thumb|right|250px|[[Silvertip tetra]] — Hasemania nana....
- HandcuffsHandcuffsHandcuffs are restraint devices designed to secure an individual's wrists close together. They comprise two parts, linked together by a chain, a hinge, or rigid bar. Each half has a rotating arm which engages with a ratchet that prevents it from being opened once closed around a person's wrist...
- Light and heavy armor