County police
County police are the police of a county in the United States and England (formerly throughout the United Kingdom).
United States
In the United States, county police tend to exist only in metropolitan counties and have countywide jurisdiction. Much more common are sheriff's departments. They fall into three broad categories:
- Full service departments provide the full spectrum of police services to the entire county, irrespective of local communities, and may provide contractual security police services to special districts within the county.
- Limited service departtments provide services to unincorporated areas of the county and usually provide contractual security police services to special districts within the county.
- Restricted service departments provide security police duties to county owned and operated facilities and parks. Some may also perform some road patrol duties on county built and maintained roads. County detectives maintained in the northeastern states by county attorneys' offices also fall within this category.
United Kingdom
In England, the police are divided into regional forces based on counties (sometimes amalgamations of two or three counties), which all provide full services throughout their districts. Police forces in Scotland and Wales also used to be organised on a county basis, but are now amalgamated into a number of large forces: eight in Scotland and four in Wales.