Sûreté

Sûreté (French for "surety" but is usually translated as "safety" or "security") is a term used in French-speaking countries or regions in the organizational title of a civil police force, especially the detective branch thereof.

France

The former title of the French National Police was La Sûreté Nationale. It served initially as the criminal investigative bureau of the Paris police and did not function as the national command and control organization until much later, by which time it no longer had any detectives on its staff.

Both the Prefecture of Police of Paris's own Brigade Criminelle and the Direction centrale de la police judiciaire trace their history directly to the Sûreté.

History

The Sûreté was founded in 1812 by Eugène François Vidocq, who headed it until 1827. It was the inspiration for Scotland Yard, the FBI, and other departments of criminal investigation throughout the world. Vidocq was convinced that crime could not be controlled by then-current police methods, so he organized a special branch of the criminal division modelled on Napoleon's political police. The force was to work undercover and its early members consisted largely of reformed criminals. By 1820 – eight years after its formation – it had blossomed into a 30-man team of experts that had reduced the crime rate in Paris by 40%.

R Reticuli

R Reticuli (R Ret) is a Mira variable star in the constellation Reticulum. It varies between magnitudes 6.35 and 14.2 over a period of 281 days. Although this star was also assigned the variable star designation S Reticuli, this designation is no longer in use.

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