Special Police Officers in Prague for Tourist Security 

A police officers team will be installed in the main tourist areas of Prague. This police team will take control in the main tourist Districts in the centre of Prague. At least seven police officers will operate daily from 10:00am till midnight in the area between Wenceslas Square and Prague Castle through the Old Town Square and Charles Bridge.

Members of the team will focus on combating street crime, above all pickpockets and money exchange fraudsters who give the gullible tourists, for instance, Bulgarian Levas instead of Czech crowns. A more intensive cooperation between the police and the city camera system operators should help as well. As soon as a camera detects a suspect, it will alarm the police and send them the spot.

As every year, mobile police stations will be installed at key junctions to help tourists in need. They will be available in Old Town Square, in Wenceslas Square, in Vitezne namesti, at Andel and in namesti Kinsky.

In each of them, there will be police officers able to tackle any problems tourists may encounter. They offer maps of Prague, first aid, as well as water for thirsty dogs on hot days.
Prague university students help the police officers deal with the tourists. “Every municipal police officer speaks one foreign language, but these students speak two or more,” says municipal police director Vladimir Kotrous.

Besides expanding cooperation with students, the municipal police is planning a new service - longer working hours. The busiest mobile police stations in Old Town Square and in Wenceslas Square will remain open until 1:00 am. The other stations will close at 6:00-7:00 pm.

The scenario is the same every year. Intrusive beggars near popular Prague monuments, fraudsters who exchange Euros and Dollars for Bulgarian Levas, pretending they are crowns, and pickpockets on the 9 and 22 Tram lines.

Municipal police combat this by posting more uniformed officers in public Transport vehicles. Forty policemen guard night trams every day. In the Metro, buses and trams, they meet state police officers in plain clothes whose task is to merge with the crowd and catch the pickpockets.