Within the field of Ottoman studies, the last decade has witnessed a growing number of studies devoted to law and order, criminal history, and legal history in a broader sense, and the present article forms part of that body of knowledge. Most studies, though not all, exam the passage to modernity during the 19th and 20th centuries. Most studies however, focus on one legal institution be it the legislator, the judicial, the police, or the penal institutions. Not many studies cross institutions. Examining the criminal procedures during the middle decades of the 19th century I noticed that the development of the criminal court system and its needs had a critical impact on the development of the police. Although the Ottoman police at the time, called the Asakir-i Zaptiye, was established as a paramilitary force, and took its structure and main mission from the French Gendarmerie, the criminal court system established alongside it in 1840 needed a law enforcement body able to carry out pre-trial procedures, collect evidence and record on paper testimony of suspects, victims and witnesses. The Supreme Council of Judicial Ordinances was the one that instructed local units to do so. Institutional historians tend to view the birth of a modern Ottoman Police in 1879, when a civil police force came into being. Accordingly, such historians show the Asakir-i Zaptiye was not really a police force, and had very little crime investigation capabilities. This paper will follow defining moments that imposed the judicial establishment to address the police and delegated it with new tasks. The civil police established in 1879 did not pop up out of the blue, it was after four long decades during which the need, the problems and the understanding such a force was due matured.