Ranks within the NYPD

Factual Questions
1

After ten years of watching NYPD Blue, I’ve come to have a curiosity about how the rank structure within the NYPD works. I therefore have some questions that I’m hoping someone (hopefully a member or ex-member of the NYPD) can answer.

I assume that the patrolman is the low man on the totem pole. These people are usually uniformed (from my very amateur observation).

Where does one go from there? Detective?

The show makes it clear that there are three different grades of detectives (3rd, 2nd and 1st). Is there any functional difference between the grades, or is it strictly a seniority/pay issue? Most detectives (from what I’ve seen) are non-uniformed.

What’s next? Sargent?
I’ve noticed that sargents tend to be uniformed (at least as depicted on the show). Do officers really go from uniformed (patrolman) to non-uniformed (detective) to uniformed (sargent)?

I’m assuming that one can become a sargent by taking the sargent’s exam. Is any officer eligible to take this exam? Even a patrolman? (i.e. can a patrolman skip over detective and go right to sargent?) Is there a certain amount of service time necessary before being eligible to take the exam?

Where do we go from here? Leiutenant? Also seems to be based on exams from the show. Are they generally non-uniformed? And, specifically, what function do they serve? While (I would imagine) that captains head up precints, do the leiutenants head up the subdivisions (detectives squad, anti-crime, etc.)?

It would seem from the show that people are not promoted to captain based on exam scores. This is from the comments of the currently (leaving) leiutenant who states that he’ll never get promoted to captain (which, if it was based on test scores wouldn’t apply). How long is one usually a leiutenant before being promoted? Do captains do anything other than head precints?

After this, I’m a bit lost. I know that there are ranks such as Deputy Inspector and Inspector, but I don’t know if they are above captain or below. Nor do I know what they do? And once one reaches the top of this command chain (Captain, Inspector, whatever?) where does one go aside from becomming the Police Commissioner?

Thanks (in advance) for your time.

Zev Steinhardt

2

The rank structure of officers in the NYPD is as follows (see this link for badges of the different ranks):

Police Officer
Detective (see below)
Sergeant
Lieutenant
Captain
Deputy Inspector
Inspector
Deputy Chief (1 star)
Assistant Chief (2 star)
Super-Chief [Chief of ___] (3 star)
Chief of Department (4 star)

Above the officers are the Police Commissioner, who is assisted by Deputy/Assistant Commissioners.

Officers advance up the ranks from PO to Captain by civil service exams (excluding Detective). I don’t know whether the exams for the higher ranks include just written tests, or have practical/interview components. Each officer ranking above Captain is legally a Captain under the civil service law, but is promoted to his or her higher rank and serves as such at the pleasure of the Police Commissioner.

Detective is a bit of an oddball rank. Officers can and do most frequently advance from PO to Sergeant without becoming a Detective, and Detectives frequently do not advance through the traditional ranks. I believe that one is appointed a detective to serve in certain positions in the Detective Bureau, the Organized Crime Control Bureau and certain other bureaus, though some Pos can serve in some detective positions before they are required to be given the gold shield of a detective. I’m not really sure how it works, however.

There are different grades of detective, and I believe that it officially has to do with their pay rates. I think that Detectives Second Grade are paid at the rate of a Sergeant, and the 100 Detectives First Grade are paid like Lieutenants. However, the higher grade detectives don’t have official supervisory responsibility, though they do have a great deal of respect. In addition, Sergeants and Lieutenants who supervise detectives can get a pay bump to that of a higher rank.

There is a supervisory chain of command in each bureau. Precincts can be commanded by Captains, Deputy Inspectors or Inspectors (I believe) and there are Sergeants and Lieutenants (and higher ranks) who are intermediate supervisors in precincts and in specialized bureaus. I understand that most Precinct detective squads are supervised by a Sergeant or a Lieutenant.

For what it is worth, much of my information is taken from reading the more accurate sort of NYPD police procedural novels, as well as non-fiction reading.

3

Would it be correct to say that detective is a position rather than a rank? I know from watching “Mystery” that in the U.K. you can have sergeants and inspectors as well as detective sergeants and detective inspectors.

Unfortunatley, it seems to me that many U.S. municipal police and sheriff’s departments, state police, and federal police have given up any idiosyncracies in the rank structure and go with the standard Army table – corporal, sergeant, lieutenant, captain, major, colonel – with “officer” stuck on the bottom and “chief” at the top.

4

As I understand English Police structure (mainly from reading police procedurals set in England, but from some references as well), the English police ranks are:

Constable <–> Detective Constable
Sergeant <–> Detective Sergeant
Inspector <–> Detective Inspector
Chief Inspector <–> Detective Chief Inspector
Superintendent <–> Detective Superintendent
Chief Superintendent <–> Detective Chief Superintendent
(higher ranks in larger departments)

I believe that the Detective titles are equal ranks to their non-detective counterparts, but those in the detective bureaus have Detective as an official part of their title.

In the NYPD, Detective is a specific rank, not just a position held by a Police Officer. Detectives have a gold shield while POs have a “white” (silver) shield, and get paid more (even at the lowest grade) than POs.

My understanding of the general run of police organizations in the US is they almost all use a structure of:

Police Officer/Patrolman/Trooper/Deputy/etc.
Detective (and sometimes Corporal)
Sergeant
Lieutenant
Captain

Above that, many municipal department have inspectors and/or chiefs, and sometimes deputies, etc. of those ranks (though some West Coast departments use the title inspector for a detective-type position between Sergeant and Lieutenant, I believe). State Police and some Sheriff’s departments use majors and colonels as higher ranks.

5

I think that in Chicago, what we usually call Detectives are called Inspectors. But I may be completely wrong about that.