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Characters / The Wire: Baltimore Police Department

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"Ever wonder what it'd be like to work in a real police department?"
Several characters

Baltimore's Finest, the BPD is Baltimore's first and last line of defense against the hordes of dealers, fiends, and yos who present a grave and terrible threat to the civil society of the good, upstanding citizens of this fair city of neighborhoods. Or at least, that's how they see themselves.

In reality, the BPD is dysfunctional and unwieldy. Decades of political obsession with producing good statistics and the War on Drugs have resulted in a department that is more concerned with massaging arrest figures and which has community relations which can be best described as "abysmal". Of all the institutions critiqued in The Wire, the BPD comes in for the most extensive criticism, as it forms the backbone of the show. Whilst various police officers and units - such as the Homicide Unit, the Daniels-led details and later Major Case Squad - demonstrate great technical competence and integrity, by and large the department is clunking, bureaucratic and brutal. Over the course of the series, various potential reformers step up and are in turn crushed by the inertia of the drug war and the political system.


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The Major Crimes Unit

See the Major Crimes Unit page.

Police Commanders

See the Police Commanders page.

Homicide

See the Homicide Unit page.

Western District

See the Western District page.

Other

    Frazier 

Randall Frazier

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/randall_frazier.jpg
You have to admit that whole Budapest thing was a hell of a pull.

A Baltimore police department medical examiner.


  • Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: He's the recurring medical examiner in the first three seasons, but he doesn't come back for the final ones, when forensic medical analysis becomes even more relevant than usual as Marlo and Jimmy become serial killers. Nobody misses him.
  • The Coroner: The resident medical examiner of Homicide. Highly competent.
  • Seen It All: He gives off this general impression. Nothing seems to surprise or rattle him.
  • The Snack Is More Interesting: He can be seen taking a snack while talking about the cases he comes across; the man is just not affected by the gruesome things he examines on a daily basis.
  • The Spock: Friezer is a just-the-facts kind of guy, with no personal or emotional involvement in his work.

    Diggins 

Claude Diggins

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thewireii_23.jpg
Played by: Jeffrey Fugitt

You're deep into somebody's shit, McNulty. I can tell.

McNulty's partner at the Marine Unit.


  • Cool Boat: He shares his fancy own boat with Bunk and McNulty to pose as a fishing craft and monitor Spiros Vondas from the sea.
  • Cool Old Guy: Diggins is significantly older than McNulty, Diggins is quite laid back and understanding. Jimmy could have landed much worse with another partner.
  • Mentor: He does his best to ease McNulty's transition into the marine unit and tries to teach him the ropes, but Jimmy doesn't want to learn, resents being on the marine unit in the first place and is really just a lousy sailor to the core.

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