Police Officer of the Year 2024 Mirka Törhönen: International information exchange is important in detecting crime
The Police Officer of the Year 2024 is Detective Sergeant Mirka Törhönen from the National Bureau of Investigation.
The Police Officer of the Year 2024 is Detective Sergeant Mirka Törhönen from the National Bureau of Investigation, who works as an analyst at Europol. Törhönen has been involved in creating new operating models for detecting crimes committed by international mobile crime groups in Finland. For the past three years, he has worked as an expert at Europol.
“His analytical work has made Törhönen a key player, above all, in combatting cross-border property crime in Finland. He has always been willing to build on his own professional skills and, above all, is prepared to share his own expertise to benefit the entire police organisation,” is the jury’s verdict.
The Police Officer of the Year 2024 was announced on Friday 25 October 2024 in Helsinki.
This year’s theme is analytics
Police analytical activities and analytics were chosen as this year’s Police Officer of the Year theme. Information is at the core of all analytical activities. The operating environment is becoming increasingly data-centric, and consequently the need to understand and analyse data plays a key role in policing today.
Police Officer of the Year, Mirka Törhönen, highlights the importance of international information exchange:
“The importance of international information exchange in preventing, detecting and investigating crime cannot be overemphasized. The amount of information to be analysed has increased, and a common situational picture is important in data processing. Producing and sharing analysed data is one of Europol's core tasks.”
Networking, cooperation and information in crime prevention
Törhönen works as a detective sergeant at Europol in the Hague. One of Europol's most important tasks is to enable and support cooperation between Member States in crime prevention.
Törhönen’s career began in 1991, when he started his career in control and emergency response duties before moving on to criminal investigation. He has worked for the police for 33 years, of which 14 years at the National Bureau of Investigation.
In 2008, the expansion of the Schengen area to the Baltic states and Eastern Europe changed the field of criminal investigations permanently. Property crime became mainly cross-border crime.
“The perpetrators were no longer just local operators, but more and more offenders came from abroad,” is how Törhönen describes the change.
The new challenges made networking with domestic and foreign authorities a priority. Obtaining criminal intelligence from law enforcement authorities in countries from where persons came to commit crimes in Finland was one of the most important tasks during operational development.
“When I joined the National Bureau of Investigation in 2010, I was involved in stepping up international cooperation and expanding the network of authorities abroad, especially among the other Nordic countries and the Baltic states,” Törhönen says in a speech marking his career.
Törhönen considers the highlight of his career to be his role as project lead in the Cross-border crime project. This was followed by him working as an operations officer in a project to combat international property crime. The aim was to share tried and tested Finnish best practices and operating models in combatting cross-border crime with the rest of Europe.
Policing capability safeguarded by legislation
In her keynote speech at the Police Officer of the Year event, Minister of the Interior Lulu Ranne said that drug-related crime, cybercrime and terrorism-related crime, for example, do not respect national borders and therefore need to be tackled in cooperation. Police capability must be safeguarded at the legislative level.
“Draft legislation on criminal intelligence activities by the police is progressing well and is expected to be submitted to Parliament in spring 2026. The removal of obstacles to the exchange of information between authorities is an important theme identified in the Government Programme, which the Ministry of the Interior has also taken forward to a legislative project.
49th Police Officer of the Year
Mirka Törhönen is the 49th Police Officer of the Year.
He considers the accolade to be the most significant honour a police officer can receive in his or her career.
“I would like to give a special mention to all experts carrying out analytical work in the field of Finland's security and crime prevention," he said at the announcement event.
Helsinki Junior Chamber of Commerce (JCI), the Finnish Police Union (SPJL) and the National Police Board of Finland jointly choose the winner of the Police Officer of the Year award. The winner of this year’s award was announced on Friday 25 October 2024 at the Finnish House of Nobility in Helsinki.
Police Officer of the Year celebrates its 50th anniversary next year
There are many different career paths and opportunities in the police that the Police of the Year accolade has highlighted over the years. Choice of the Police Officer of the Year is always an awaited and respected recognition. Next year will be a special year, as the Police Officer of the Year will be chosen for the 50th time.
You can find out about the diverse career opportunities in police on the Career stories website, where you can also find Mirka Törhönen’s and Police Officer of the Year 2023 Ismo Venäläinen’s stories about their careers. There are interesting career paths open in the police both for police officers and civilians.
