Questura of the Kingdom of Italy
In the Kingdom of Italy, the Questura is an office of the Directorate-General of Public Security with provincial jurisdiction, reporting to the Ministry of the Interior. It is led by a Quaestor (Italian: Questore). Within the Administration of Public Security, the Questura is tasked with the direct execution and performance of police and security services. Every Questura has its seat in the capital city of the province, depending on the relevant Prefect.
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Quaestor
The Quaestor (Italian: Questore) is a civilian official of the Ministry of Interior of the Administration of Public Security who, within a Province, hierarchically dependent on the Prefect, is in charge of the technical direction of police services and public order, and is also invested with specific attributions (issue of certain licenses and authorisations, etc.). The Quaestor is a member of the provincial committee for order and public security in his double capacity of Provincial and Local Authority of Public Security (the latter for the provincial capital only).
The Quaestor has the role of head of the Questura he directs, having a say in the centrally-directed choice of delicate positions of the relevant Questura, without having to follow an excessively rigid architecture.
His sphere of action concerns prevention and repression of crimes, the guarantee of the fascist order, the provision of aid in the event of public or private accidents. He is also responsible for activities relating to police authorisations, possession of weapons, expatriation and immigration.
Provincial Quaestors organise frequent meetings during which the commanders of the provincial Questura and the commanders of the special units which are deployed in the province and are not outside his command analyse the investigative findings and plan joint operational activities.
It is to be noted that the term "Quaestor" is both a rank and an office: not all officials ranked Quaestors are in service at provincial Questure, but almost all Questure are headed by an official ranking Quaestor of 1st or 2nd Class, according the importance of the location. Sometimes, for very important seats, a Director-General of Peripheral Office is assigned.
Provincial Authority of Public Security
Together with the Prefect, the Quaestor is one of the two Provincial Authorities of Public Security. The Quaestor is the Provincial Authority of Public Security at a technical-operational level.
Quaestor orders
The Quaestor can issue orders. The Quaestor's orders have the characteristic of being strictly typified and strictly addressed to the members of the public security administration only.
Vice-Quaestor Vicar
The Vice-Quaestor Vicar (commonly abbreviated as "Vicar") is the first and direct collaborator of the Quaestor, overseeing the numerous offices of the Questura and the most delicate services of public order, he presides over some important work Commissions, such as the Provincial Council for Discipline, the provincial commission for explosive materials and participates in the provincial public show commission. Finally, the Vicar ensures the replacement of the Quaestor in his absences.
The Vice-Quaestor Vicar ranks immediately below the Quaestor: this means that he is an Official of a grade who goes from Vicequestore (rank) to Inspector General (equivalent to Quaestor, 1st Class, or Brigadier General).
As a rule, the officials taking on this role are the closest candidates for promotion to Quaestor.
Classification
The Questure are classified according to an analysis conducted through a method that includes the incidence of measurable variables with quantitative and statistical data and the politically, strategic and subversive sensitivity of the individual site.
- Category - A: Questure of Rome, Milan and Naples;
- Category - B: 17 Questure;
- Category - C: 14 Questure;
- Category - D: 50 Questure;
- Category - E: 18 Questure.
Questure falling within the A Category are in charge of highly sensitive provinces and urban environments. Therefore, each Questura of this category is led by a Quaestor ranking Director General of P.S. in charge of Peripheral Office (equal to a Major General) and the local Mobile Squad is an autonomous Division and consists of 10 Sections.
Questure within the B Category guard provinces which are sensitive and delicate, although not as sensitive as A Category provinces. These Questure are also led by a Director General of P.S. in charge of Peripheral Office (junior in rank to those assigned to the A Category Questure), but their Mobile Squads have 8 Sections each.
Questure of C and D Categories are in charge of generally quiet provinces and both are led by Quaestors ranking Quaestor, 1st Class (equal to a Brigadier General) and both have 5 Sections in their Mobile Squads. Category-C Questure oversee a population greater than the population overseen by Category-D Questure.
Eventually, Questure of the E Category are in charge of quiet and peaceful provinces. This tranquillity is met by a Quaestor ranking Quaestor, 2nd Class (equal to a Colonel) or, in some limited cases, ranking Quaestor, 1st Class (but newly appointed). Their Mobile Squad have 4 Sections each. The class E Questure have an organic layout of a minimum of 172 operators, including Officials of Public Security and members of the Royal Police Corps. This staff is made up of a Quaestor, 9 Officers and Officials and 162 Agents and Subofficers, as well as 1 Medical Officer and 1 Medical Subofficer.
General organisation
The offices of the Questura are divided into four divisions: the first (cabinet) waits to services more directly aimed at the maintenance of order, the second (police) provides for the discovery of the crime and is maintained for such purposes, in direct contact with the judicial authorities and the third (administrative police) exercises functions of a preventive nature, while the territorial control activity is performed by the fourth Division. Each Division is directed by a senior Official of Public Security, ranking Deputy Quaestor or Quaestor, 2nd Class: this makes the Division of the Questura equal to an Office of the central organisation.
- Operations Room
- Division I (Cabinet): the Cabinet Division includes both operational and administrative support offices.
- Division II (Anti-Crime police): Mobile Squad (corresponding to the U.K. Criminal Investigations Department and to the CC.RR. Operational Department), Identification Cabinet, Scientific Police Cabinet, Permanent Criminal Records of the judicial police, Identity cards and notifications register and Criminal general archive.
- Division III (Administrative and Social police): administrative police affairs and archives. The Administrative Division includes within its activities the issuance of various permits, such as commercial permits of public security, passports and weapons licenses; within the Division there are also police offices for minors and social policing, as well as Foreigners and Immigrants office.
- Division IV (General Prevention): the Division deals with prevention activities, police intelligence, patrols and territorial control.
Provincial capital cities are divided into Sections of Public Security. For each Section is headed by a Commissioner, a Assistant Commissioner and one or more Deputy Commissioners and Assistant Deputy Commissioners. Each section has at its disposal an Agents Squad of the Royal Police Corps, while each Province is organised under a Provincial Group of the Corps.
Division I - Cabinet
Division I - Cabinet (It.: Divisione I - Gabinetto) acts as the secretariat of the Quaestor, representing the office charged with putting his directives into practice. The Head of Cabinet is a civilian official of absolute trust of the Quaestor, given the delicacy of the task; the Cabinet consists of subordinate personnel (usually Subofficers).
The Cabinet Division includes both operational police offices, such as General and Confidential Affairs Office, Public order Office and the Political Office, and administrative support offices, such as Personnel (for civilian personnel), Accounting, Safety, Health, Barracking and Equipment Offices. This Division includes the archives of the Cabinet, Political Office and Foreigners Surveillance Office and operates the Complaints Office. Sometimes, in major Questure, Division I (Cabinet) is split between operational police offices, which remain in the Division, and the administrative structures, which form Division V (Administration).
In an A-Category Questura, Division I - Cabinet includes the following subdivisions:
- Quaestor's Secretariat;
- Antechamber of the Quaestor;
- General Affairs Section;
- Complaints Section;
- Press and Public Relations Office;
- Public Order Office;
- Political Office;
- Archive Office;
- Correspondence Office;
- Foreigners Surveillance Office;
- Control Activity and Deportation Section;
- Secretariat of the Chief of Cabinet;
- C.P.R. Liaison Officer;
- Local Police Liaison Office;
- Security Executive Office: responsible for the management of classified documents;
- Operational Section.
Political Office
The Political Office, at the peripheral level, is framed within Division I - Cabinet within each Questura. The provincial Political Office is entrusted of a variety of functions, which include the collection of information about the overall situation, including for the prevention of public order breaking, the investigation for the prevention and punishment of crimes against the State and against the public order, politically driven or terrorism offences and crimes.
Each Political Office maintains an its own political archive, which is kept distinct from the general archive. In Questure, Political Offices often have a physically separate wing dedicated to their own use.
Office of Public Order and Traffic
The Office of Public Order and Traffic (Ufficio per l'Ordine Pubblico e la Circolazione, U.O.Pu.C.) is an office existing only within Division I - Cabinet of the Questura of Rome. Strictly related with the Political Office, it is responsible for maintaining public order (festive or political events on the public highway), protecting the headquarters of institutions and diplomatic representations, monitoring compliance with the provisions of the highway code and, in in particular, preventing and combating crime and traffic violence.
Division II - Anticrime Police
Division II - Anticrime Police (It.: Divisione II - Polizia Anticrimine) is the Division tasked with conducting investigations and judicial police tasks. The Division is the cornerstone office in small to medium Questure, while in larger Questure (Rome, Milan and Naples) the Division is flanked by the Mobile Squad, which is elevated to a full Divisional level.
Office of Criminal Police Investigations
The Office of Criminal Police Investigations (It: Ufficio Investigativo di Polizia Criminale, U.I.Po.C.) is the subdivision of the Questura tasked with coordinating duties of Division II - Anti-Crime police (operated and staffed by C.P.R. and P.S.) and Carabinieri Operational Department. Usually, the leadership of the Office of Judicial Police Investigations is held, on a rotatory basis, by the Commander of the Carabinieri Operational Department or by the Head of the Anticrime Division.
Mobile Squad
The Mobile Squad (It: Squadra Mobile) is the cornerstone office of Division II - Anti-Crime police, tasked with performing investigations duties. The Mobile Squad is usually headed by a Vicequestore, but also by a Quaestor, 2nd Class (rank) in most important cities. The Mobile Squad is the direct counterpart of British Criminal Investigations Branches and leads investigations to identify those responsible for the urban-originated crimes and the collection of the relevant sources of evidence. The assigned personnel operate almost exclusively in plain clothes; the activity of the Division is solely and exclusively the detective work, which is mainly devoted to law enforcement action, while the prevention activity is normally delegated to other offices. Detective work is carried out making extensive use of informers in all areas of life in society, both in the sphere of organised crime and in political circles. Each Mobile Squad is structured around ten Sections, each headed by C.P.R. Majors and specialising in a particular category of offences and in turn it is divided into Units, headed by a C.P.R. Captain:
- 1st Section: General Affairs.
- 2nd Section: Organised Crime (coordinated by the Criminal Police Centres of the Regional Offices of Public Security).
- 3rd Section: Foreign Crime.
- 4th Section: Offences against the person.
- Psychic Crimes and Crisis Unit: this team consisting of police officers and psychiatrists respond to bizarre and frightening crises and solve cases involving emotionally disturbed criminals, victims and/or witnesses.
- 5th Section: Vice.
- 6th Section: Offences against property.
- 7th Section: Offences against the Public Administration.
- Offences in the sphere of the consumer market and the execution of the administrative law Unit.
- 8th Section: Anti-Crime.
- 9th Section: Drug and Narcotics.
- 10th Section: Fugitives.
In smaller Questure some Sections are merged, while in major cities (A Category) the Mobile Squad is an autonomous Division which operates alongside the Division II - Anti-Crime Police; in the latter case, the Division is headed by a Quaestor, 2nd Class (who is not the deputy of the Provincial Quaestor) and all subdivisions are one level higher (Sections becoming Offices, Units becoming Sections, etc.). Such modifications are decided by the Chief of Police.
Ordinarily, the Unit Head is a C.P.R. junior officer (Lieutenant or Captain), while members are C.P.R. enlisted troops or Subofficers; in some cases, civilian officials officers may be assigned to the Mobile Squad.
Provincial cabinets of Scientific Police
The Provincial cabinets of Scientific Police are established in every Questura (with the exception of those where there is already the Inter-provincial Cabinet) and are framed into the Anti-Crime Division. They have specific responsibility to carry out the Inspection of the Scientific Police and photographic identification.
Minors Office
The Minors Office (Ufficio Minori) is part of the criminal police division, with the aim of providing support to children in difficulty and their families. At this office, qualified personnel work to listen to children, perpetrators or victims of crimes. The Minors Office operates as a hub, bringing together personnel of the Administrative and Social Police Division, social services operators and other expertise, liaising with private foundations, but also with the collaboration of the Italian Youth of the Lictor, the O.N.M.I. and schools.
Specifically, the Children Office deals with the abandonment of minors, pornography and child prostitution, the illegal use of child labour, sexual abuse of minors, the use or sale of drugs and ill-treatment.
Division III - Administrative and Social police
The Division III - Administrative and Social Police (It.: Divisione Polizia Amministrativa e Sociale, Di.P.A.S.) deals with police affairs and administrative archives. The third Division includes within its activities the issuance of various permits, such as commercial permits of public security, passports and weapons licenses; within the Division there are also police offices for minors and social policing, as well as Foreigners and Immigrants office. This Division is the real instrument of control, through which the Questura manages to exercise a power of blackmail and surveillance on the territory.
An ordinary Questura has ten subdivisions within the Administrative and Social Police Division:
- Office I - Weapons and carrying weapons;
- Office II - Police licenses pertaining to gambling and betting;
- Office III - Food and beverages licenses;
- Office IV - Licensing leisure places;
- Office V - Public Security Authorisations for Commercial activities;
- Office VI - Passports;
- Office VII - Pyrotechnics;
- Office VIII - Immigration;
- Office IX - Explosives;
- Office X - Armouries;
- Office XI - Commercial flights and UAVs;
- Office XII - Foreigners Surveillance: this Office is always present in every Questura;
- Control Activity Section: the operational arm of the Division.
Any variation of the organisation of the individual Questura is decided by the Chief of Police.
Division IV - General Prevention
The Division IV - General Prevention (It: Divisione IV - Prevenzione Generale) is responsible for the general supervision and control of priority activities on the whole territory. Through continuous patrol, it ensures the security of the first and immediate response to the needs of citizens. As part of the Division operate "Patrol Cars", "Quick Reaction Operational Units" and "Neighbourhood Police" Sections. Being a subdivision which requires very few detective work, the General Prevention Division is massively staffed by military personnel, and by relatively few civilian officials, which mainly exercise supervisory functions.
Patrol Cars Section
The Patrol Cars Section (Sezione Autopattuglie) is a section of the General Prevention Division, is headed by a military officer, and it is present in each Questura. The same service performed by Commissariats is known as as "Radio Cars" (Radiomobili). Patrol Cars Sections are in direct contact with citizens in the cities; directed by radio from the Operations Room of their Province, the patrol cars get involved to any request for assistance received by the public emergency number 111. For this reason, the operators of the patrol car and the radio car must be able to face any type of intervention.
For each turn there are two or more patrol cars, depending on the city/town size; each patrol car is assigned a specific and precise area to be covered. Each turn is headed by a coordinating Marshal of P.S., who is responsible for the entire turn: he, at the beginning of turn, decides crews, sectors to assign and what patrol cars which have to carry out the services other than emergency (fixed surveillance, picketing, treatments of arrested/stopped people, etc..). The Patrol Cars, in addition to the repression service, also are entrusted of prevention service. The police patrol crews, who know their area of jurisdiction and the people who habitually frequents, observe carefully what is around them while patrolling the area, and this observation allows both to intervene promptly in case of need and to deter potential attackers.
Special Patrol
The Special Patrol (Italian: Pattuglia Speciale, informally Pattuglione) is a police patrol organised and executed for the specific needs of territorial control. Usually the "Pattuglione" is composed of a team of 10 to 15 agents on four or five cars. Such patrols can be arranged for the most different purposes: a type that is performed regularly, especially during the most unstable, is the patrol of the Political Office. Each patrol is coordinated by a Public Security Official, while on the field agents are controlled and commanded by a Subofficer; personnel may be drawn from the P.S., Local Police and MVSN. Special Patrols are conducted by an evident uniformed patrol, which is assisted by plain-clothes personnel.
Quick Reaction Operational Units
Quick Reaction Operational Units (It.: Unità Operative di Pronto Impiego, U.O.P.I.) are police special teams, whose main mission is to patrol places of worship, art and culture potentially at risk of attacks, as well as to provide support to the Political Office and to the Mobile Squad for high-risk searches and arrests. The service provided is essentially preventive in nature, but also involves the repressive-reaction part. Agents, which move aboard armoured vehicles, are trained to take action first in case of terrorist attacks, without fixed locations but being moved from time to time by the police to oversee the objectives deemed sensitive. They are also trained to disarm people potentially hostile or dangerous people. Agents are equipped with bulletproof vests, body armours, helmets, high-definition cameras, assault rifles, submachine guns, light weapons and pepper spray.
The team consists of a dozen men, belonging to the local Questura, carefully selected and trained by the N.O.C.S., the police national emergency and counterterrorism unit. The patrols are composed of four agents.
The anti-terrorist squad is present in some Provinces: Padua, Venice, Verona, Rome, Milan, Naples, Florence, Turin, Genoa, Modena, Ancona, Bari, Brindisi, Prato, Bolzano, Taranto, Lecce, Trieste. Agents of U.O.P.I. are chosen on a voluntary basis between the younger personnel (up to 30 years of age) in each province; in the provinces where there is a Celere Unit, the selection is also open to the agents employed by the Celere Unit itself. The selection criteria are very strict. Given the preventive nature of the service provided, the units are incorporated within the local General Prevention Division.
Division V - Administration
The Division V - Administration (It.: Divisione V - Amministrazione), not to be confused with Division III - Administrative and Social Police, is the subdivision which includes all administrative and support offices. The fifth Division is distinct from the Cabinet only in the main Questure (Rome, Milan, Naples). In B to E Category Questure the Administration Division is merged with Division I. The Division includes:
- Civilian personnel Office;
- IT Office;
- Purchasing Office;
- Housing Office;
- Accounting Office.
