ON DISPLAY, ONCE AGAIN, ARTIFACTS OF POLICE PAST

Not many museums have a display of the drugs available on the streets of
New York City, complete with syringes, pipes and other paraphernalia.

The pills and powders -- which are not real -- are intended as a warning,
not a lure. They and a 1973 Plymouth Fury squad car, a ceremonial ivory
nightstick and thousands of other law enforcement items are housed in the
New York City Police Museum, which is scheduled to reopen to the public in
mid-January in its new location at 100 Old Slip, just south of South Street
Seaport.

Today, Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani will stand in an assembly hall on the
building's second floor, next to a model jail cell, and announce the
museum's reopening.

In a sense, it is a homecoming. Carved into the facade of the museum's new
home, an impressive Renaissance Revival palazzo built in 1909, are the
words "Police Station," a reminder of the building's role as the home from
1884 to 1973 of the First Precinct, which one historian called "the most
important police precinct in the world."

The museum is moving there from its previous location in the old Cunard
Building at 25 Broadway on Bowling Green, where a former police
commissioner, Howard Safir, had transplanted a historical collection from
the Police Academy, at 235 East 20th Street, in 1999. Earlier this year,
the museum aroused some controversy when Police Commissioner Bernard B.
Kerik learned of apparent budgetary improprieties by police officials
working there and reassigned the staff members.

The museum staff is now mostly made up of civilians, although one police
officer will help prepare displays and give tours, said Todd Ciaravino, the
new executive director. The museum displaced the Landmarks Preservation
Commission, which occupied this building -- itself a landmark -- from 1993
until last summer. The museum will receive both city and private financing,
and admission will be free, though a donation amount will be suggested.
There will also be a gift shop selling official police T-shirts and other
paraphernalia.

"It is a bit of a love letter to the department," said Carol Safir, the
unsalaried president of the museum's board of directors, and the wife of
the former commissioner.

Stepping inside the front doors, visitors are faced with a large wooden
desk taken from the 46th Precinct station in the Bronx. "We tried to give
it the look of an old precinct," said Mr. Ciaravino, a former assistant to
both Mr. Safir and Mr. Giuliani.

Renovation of the building to prepare it for its new use, which was paid
for by the city, was completed on time and on budget, at $4 million, Mr.
Ciaravino said, even though the work began on Sept. 10 and was delayed
considerably by the attack on the World Trade Center.

Even if the attack did not alter the museum's timing, it certainly changed
its content. On the third floor, the first temporary exhibit will be
photographs from Sept. 11, with letters and cards sent by children to the
Police Department afterward. There will also be a permanent wall with the
names of all the 23 city police officers, 13 Port Authority officers, and
343 firefighters who were killed in the attack.

Elsewhere, the museum provides an escape into law enforcement history. On
the first floor, there are century-old police uniforms and a maroon 1950's
officer's motorcycle with an Indian head emblem on the front fender.
Upstairs, in a room for what the museum designates vintage weapons and
notorious criminals, are pictures and capsule biographies of some crooks,
from Al Capone and "Louie the Lump" to Mock Duck, described as the most
feared and powerful gangster in Chinatown in the early 20th century.

There is even a set of lock-picking tools that belonged to Willie Sutton,
the notorious escape artist and, says a description on the wall, the
"nation's most infamous bank robber."

One room contains a nod to the department's fame. Video screens there
display clips from classic shows that feature the department, like "Kojak."
There is the Hall of Heroes, with the name and badge of every New York
police officer killed in the line of duty, starting with Officer David
Martin of the Second Precinct, killed on Aug. 6, 1861.

The museum also includes plenty of material for would-be detectives,
including a fake crime scene complete with beige couch and armchair ("no
one's taking credit for picking those out," Mr. Ciaravino said),
bloodstains and a victim outline in tape on the floor.

Next door, there is a firearms training simulator, open only to adults, in
which visitors can hold a gun and aim a laser at a criminal displayed on a
screen.

Although many of the exhibits were part of the museum at its old location,
some are new, including a display on the transit police and the jail cell.
There will also be an exhibit on the use of DNA testing in police work,
provided by the American Museum of Natural History.

The police museum's purpose, Mr. Ciavarino said, is to educate the public
and provide the department with some good publicity.

"I didn't think police officers were being fairly treated," he said. "The
headlines were always negative, and you didn't see the good side.
Hopefully, this museum will change that."