UK police ranks and duties

Based on my extensive experience with the British police (i.e. reading British crime novels and watching Luther and Hot Fuzz), those would be ranks starting with "Detective." Detective Constable, Detective Sergeant (DS), Detective Inspector (DI), Detective Chief Inspector (DCI). If the UK promotes in a similar manner to the US it's unlikely an officer in his early twenties would have made it to sergeant, so he'd be a constable. Although in the US you're usually required to spend a couple of years on patrol before you can try for detective, so someone in his early twenties being in an investigative role at all might be unrealistic.

Not always. I've seen a couple RL DS's who were under thirty. I think they're the 'fast track' professional ones, people who went to perhaps Uni to study Criminology or something, then straight to the Police Training School in Hendon (or wherever). But you're right in that at that age, most of 'em would be DC's.

Early twenties makes this tricky. The earliest you can apply to join the Met is 18, but as has already been noted officers start as constables and work their way up. Mid-20s Detective Constable is possible. I have a late 20s DS in my book (which has been read by a Met Police DS).

Go to YouTube and look for episodes of The Bill - a serial based around a police station in London that ran for about 25 years. You'll get a familiarity with the ranks and workings of the met, albeit hyped up for TV.

Have a faint memory that London runs a bit differently from the rest of the country - need to check. Maybe the same at lower ranks and different higher up. Not sure.

Is it a uniformed police officer or a plainclothes detective? It's feasible that someone in their late 20s would be at the rank of Sergeant (uniformed) or Detective Sergeant (CID).

There are also a number of police forces that have jurisdiction over different parts of London: the Metropolitan Police for the boroughs, the City Police for the City of London (the square mile of the financial district), and the British Transport Police for the railways. The Metropolitan Police is further divided into 32 Borough Operational Command Units, with Westminster's having some extra Government affairs responsibilities (I think).

So one officer of any operational rank is going have significant bureaucratic hurdles trying to move around the city.

AceAdam said:

I'm developing a story about a vigilante who assists and is assisted by a police officer. They'll mainly be focussing on serial killers and drug dealers. Problem is, I don't know much about how the police force works in London. Any ideas what rank the officer should have that'll allow him to investigate or have access to investigations in the areas mentioned? I want him to be in his early twenties.

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waylander said:

Early twenties makes this tricky. The earliest you can apply to join the Met is 18, but as has already been noted officers start as constables and work their way up. Mid-20s Detective Constable is possible. I have a late 20s DS in my book (which has been read by a Met Police DS).

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As others have mentioned, the age makes it unlikely they'll be much above DC, DS at most. Even then, they're unlikely to be independently investigating serial killers. There would be a number of more senior officers above them in that sort of case - most likely the investigation would be run by a Detective Chief Inspector (DCI) at the least, with a number of Detective Inspectors (DIs) reporting into them, each with DSs and DCs assigned to the DI teams. If it's a case that's in the media or otherwise sensitive, shift everything up a rank - so a DSI leading the investigation.

That means that your detective is going to be limited in what they can get to. Doesn't mean it's impossible, and if you're clever you can use those obstacles to create drama and tension.

Your police officer is going to have to be careful about accessing information on cases they are not working on. The police are tightening up on their data protection and there have been a number of proseceutions for doing exactly that. They would usually be worried about data being passed to organised crime rather than vigilantes but it still puts obstacles in your character's path.

Most of London is policed by the Metropolitan Police Service - commonly known as "the Met". It does work a bit different than other police forces in Britain, so you'd have to look specifically at the Met for your research, not just policing in general in the UK.

You should certainly check out the website of the Met and read, well, most of it.
http://content.met.police.uk/Home

And the Wikipedia page about the Met includes ranks and all sorts of stuff to get you started.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_Police_Service

By the way I don't think there are a lot of serial killers operating in London at any one time. Not enough to keep a vigilante busy anyway. Drug dealers though, certainly.

Did 20 years in the Met. What period is your Novel set current day? There are a number of ways they could access information particularly if they were seconded to an AMIT (Area Major Investigation Team) which is set up to investigate major incidents. What are you looking for exactly you can ask here or PM me.
Best, Steve