Bolivian National Police
| Bolivian National Police Corps Cuerpo de Policía Nacional |
|
|---|---|
| Abbreviation | CdPN |
| Agency overview | |
| Formed | 1886 |
| Employees | 31,000 |
| Legal personality | Governmental: Government agency |
| Jurisdictional structure | |
| General nature | |
| Operational structure | |
| Headquarters | La Paz |
| Sworn members | 31,000 carabineros and agentes |
| Agency executive | Col. Ciro Oscar Farfán Medina, Comandante General de la Policia Boliviana |
| Facilities | |
| Stations | 9 major |
| Website | |
| Official website | |
Law enforcement in Bolivia is based on the 31,000-strong Cuerpo de Policía Nacional (National Police Corps) responsible for internal security and maintaining law and order. Unlike most Latin American countries, the Bolivian police force always has been accountable to the national government rather than to state or local officials. The 1950 Organic Law of Police and Carabiniers officially separated the police from the military. Frequently, however, the national police call upon the military for assistance in quelling riots and civil protests.
The countrywide emergency number for the police, including the highway patrol, is 110.
Although the Marshal of Ayacucho, Antonio José de Sucre Alcalá, had organized the first Bolivian police force on June 24, 1826, the National Police (Policía Nacional) was not established officially until 1886. The Bolivian police became institutionalized on the national level in 1937 with the creation of the National Corps of Carabineers (Cuerpo Nacional de Carabineros) and its professional training school, the Police School (Escuela de Policía), later renamed the National Police Academy (Academia Nacional de Policías). The carabineers constituted a post-Chaco War merger of the military police, the Gendarmerie Corps (Cuerpo de Gendarmería), the paramilitary Security Police (Policía de Seguridad) and the Army's Carabineer Regiment (Regimiento de Carabineros).
Bolivia's police forces had always been responsible to the national government rather than to lesser political authorities. The concept of centralized police power is established by the Constitution. The Police Law of 1886 formalized the system that remained in effect throughout the first half of the twentieth century. In 1950 the Organic Law of Police and Carabineers of Bolivia (Law No. 311) revised the police system substantially. Law No. 311 and the 1886 law provide the legal basis for the present-day police system.
Before the 1952 revolution, the police corps was subordinate to the army and to the Ministry of National Defense. The army assumed most police functions and treated the corps as a reserve to be called on only in times of dire emergency. As a result of its active support of the revolution, however, the national police received greater jurisdiction over police affairs and was modernized. It and the carabineers were transferred to the jurisdiction of what was then the Ministry of Interior, which concerned itself exclusively with administrative supervision. Nevertheless, the police resented being commanded by an army officer and having lower status and pay than the military.
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Wikipedia