Provincial Sheriff (Canada)

In all but one province of Canada, the provincial government, in addition to the provincial police, which handles the majority of law enforcement matters at the provincial level, including routine aspects like patrolling provincial highways and contracting with rural districts to provide local policing services, there also exists a Sheriff of the Province, the official title of the head of the province's sheriff's department, which has equal policing powers at the provincial level as the provincial police, but which focuses its authority and responsibilities on three main areas: 1) security of the provincial judicial system, down to local trial courts, meaning all courtroom bailiffs are sheriff's deputies and security at all courthouses is provided by deputies; 2) transportation of all remanded detainees and all provincial convicts between all facilities, whether prison to prison or jail to court; and 3) handling high-risk and specialised operations, including witness protection, transportation of dangerous convicts, airplane security, plainclothes protection of senior provincial government members and those in the justice system, risk-assessment, other special operations, etc.

While virtually all activity of sheriff's deputies (the term used instead of "officer" to describe sworn peace officers of the service, except for the Sheriff him/herself) involves elements quite apart from routine policing, all deputies are indeed peace officers, and thus have the right to enforce the Criminal Code in any and all situations, like any other police officer. This is why a provincial sheriff's department may conduct targeted operations of its own without the approval of other law enforcement agencies.

Currently, the largest provincial sheriff's department is the Ontario Sheriff's Office (OSO), and the smallest is the Prince Edward Island Sheriff Service. Quebec is the only province without its own provincial sheriff's service: in Quebec, the Sûreté du Québec (the province's provincial police, which is sometimes known as the Quebec Provincial Police in English) carries out all the responsibilities of both a provincial police and a provincial sheriff's department, with the Directeur-Général du Sûreté (head of the agency) acting as both provincial police commissioner and as Sheriff of Québec.