Bermuda Police Service

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Coverage
Bermuda Police Service
Bermuda Police Service area
Area	Bermuda
Size	53.3 km²
Population	Approx 66,000
Operations
Formed	1879
HQ	Hamilton
Officers	450
Divisions
Stations	3
Commissioner	George Jackson

Website	Bermuda Police

Hamilton Police Constable Thomas Joseph Powell. ca. 1890.

The Bermuda Police Service was created in 1879. Bermuda's first police, from settlement, until then, had been nine Parish constables (one for each Parish). These positions were filled by men appointed for twelve months, unpaid service, until pay was introduced in the 19th Century. These appointments were cumpulsory, akin to jury duty. Dissatisfaction with the quality of this part-time Constabulary led to the formation of the Bermuda Police Force under the Police Establishment Act, 1879. The new body consisted of ten full time constables under Superintendent J. C. B. Clarke. Three of the constables were based in Hamilton, with Clarke, three in St. George's, with Chief Constable H. Dunkley, and two in Somerset, and there were still twenty-one part-time Parish constables. The size of the police force was trebled in 1901. The first Detective was appointed in 1919, and the Force underwent another reorganisation in 1920, with eighteen constables recruited from the UK raising its strength to forty-six. The size of the force grew steadily over the following decades. The Bermuda Reserve Constabulary was created in 1951. With the closure of the HM Dockyard, and the attendant military garrison, in 1958, Police Headquarters, and other elements relocated to Prospect Camp, the former military heaquarters. A Womans' Department was established in 1961 with the first five female police officers. A marine section was formed in 1962. The Bermuda Police found itself performing a new role in the 1960s, Internal Security, as it dealt with riots resulting from the battle for racial equality. This culminated with the riots of 1977. These riots resulted from the death sentences handed down to two men accused of five murders, including those of Governor Richard Sharples, his ADC, Captain Hugh Sayers, and the Commissioner of Police, George Duckett. While remaining on the law books, the death penalty had not been used in Bermuda for three decades. As the two men convicted were both Black, many Blacks saw the sentences as racially motivated.

Hamilton Police Station.

In 1995, the Bermuda Police Force was re-named the Bermuda Police Service. It was thought that the word 'force' had unsavoury connotations. The Reserve Constabulary was renamed the Bermuda Reserve Police^[1] and adopted the same uniform as the full-time Police officers. This was meant to address the common misconception they had suffered from, which was that they were not 'real' police officers. Today, the Police Service continues to operate from the three police stations in Hamilton, St. George's, and Somerset, and the Headquarters at Prospect Camp, and a small Marine Police Station on Barr's Bay, in Hamilton. Following the closure of the US Naval Air Station in Bermuda, the Scenes Of Crimes officers have moved to a building there.

The current strength of the Service is 450 full-time officers, supported by 100 reserve officers.