Inspector

Inspector is both a police rank and an administrative position, both used in a number of contexts. However, it is not an equivalent rank in each police force. In the United States, the term inspector can have very different meanings depending on the law enforcement agency. In the New York City Police Department, an inspector is a high-ranking executive position, two grades above a Captain, one grade above a Deputy Inspector, and immediately below a Deputy Chief. Inspectors in the NYPD wear the eagle insignia worn by colonels in both the military and the New York State Police, and their rank may be thought of in those terms. In the LAPD, the rank of inspector, one grade above captain, was changed to commander in 1974, because LAPD senior officers preferred the more military-sounding title. Inspector is a senior executive rank in both the MPDC and the Philadelphia Police Department; inspectors in both departments wear the insignia of a lieutenant colonel.

In the United Kingdom, inspector is the second supervisory rank. It is senior to that of sergeant, but junior to that of chief inspector. The rank is mostly operational, meaning that inspectors are directly concerned with day-to-day policing. Uniformed inspectors are often responsible for supervising a duty shift made up of constables and sergeants, or act in specialist roles such as supervising road traffic policing.

The rank of inspector has existed since the foundation of the Metropolitan Police, formed in 1829, when it was used to designate the rank immediately below that of superintendent, and many Commonwealth police forces also use the term.

Plain-clothes detective inspectors are equal in rank to their uniformed counterparts, the prefix "detective" identifying them as having been trained in criminal investigation and being part of or attached to their force's Criminal Investigation Department (CID).