If you've never been through it, the São Paulo Civil Police entrance exam sounds like a test. It isn't — it's a marathon. In episode 49 of Palavrão Tático, recorded in partnership with Criminal Cast, Eliel Teixeira and Edwin Wu asked delegado Maurício de Tomasi to walk them through the process from the inside — the phases, how hard it is, what changed from one generation to the next. His answer started with a number that caught both of them off guard: a process that can take a year and a half.

The phases, one after another

According to the guest, the basic structure of the delegado exam hasn't changed since the first time he took it, in 2005. The academic part has three stages:

• multiple-choice exam;
• written exam — an essay plus short-answer questions;
• oral board, in front of a panel of four or five examiners.

Then come the physical agility test (the TAF), the medical and psychological exams and, last, the longest phase: the social investigation. "It's the background check," he explained. The board gets hundreds of names at once — 400, 500, 600 — and the police have to dig into the life of every candidate in that batch. It isn't continuous hiring, like many American departments that recruit year-round: everything moves in blocks, at the pace of the official notice.

The oral board is where Maurício washed out on his first try. He failed a section on Administrative Law — the part about how the police oversee regulated activities. "I spent years licking that wound," he said. He became obsessed with the subject so he'd never make that mistake again.

136,000 candidates for 1,200 openings

The exam he remembers best is the 2008 investigator exam, known internally as IP-08 (Investigador de Polícia 08). Because the São Paulo Civil Police covers the entire state — 645 municipalities — and exams are sometimes held back for years, every new notice turns into a massive event. According to the guest, there were about 136,000 candidates for 1,200 openings. "That's an entire city," the hosts reacted.

On the first list, Maurício said, only about 380 people passed — not much for that many openings. After some questions were thrown out, the number went up, and somewhere around 950 candidates moved on in the process (he points out he's going from memory, almost 20 years later). He got about 90 of the 100 questions right and finished near the top.

What changed in 2008: criminology and logical reasoning

Until then, the multiple-choice test covered Portuguese, math, history, geography, law and computer skills. IP-08 changed that: logical reasoning and criminology were added — according to him, the first time criminology ever showed up on a São Paulo police exam. For someone coming from social sciences who was already studying criminology on his own, it was like the test had been written for him. "Out goes math, which I know nothing about, and in comes criminology. They want me in the police."

The problem was that nobody really knew what would be on it. The prep courses had no reference, because the subject had never been tested. Logical reasoning, on the other hand, had a guide: the Federal Police exams, which had been testing that content for years.

The rule that doesn't forgive an Achilles' heel

One detail of the São Paulo exam changes your whole study strategy: you have to get at least half of each subject block right. It doesn't help to ace Portuguese and law and bomb computer skills. "You can't fool the examiner." For him, the weak spots were exactly logic and computer skills — and that's where he put the most work.

The method: a whiteboard, a 700-page book and a summary of the summary

The prep he described is that of someone who went all in. Already hired by Banco do Brasil, he quit the job and went to work at a prep school so he'd get a scholarship and could study full time. "There's no going back."

• Back to basics when needed: he bought third- and fourth-grade books to relearn fractions and long division.
• Old exams as a map: he took the Federal Police logical-reasoning exams, put each question on a whiteboard he installed in his living room and spent days working on it, until he built his own solving models — tables and shortcuts simpler than the instructors'.
• Repetition and synthesis: he read a 700-page computer-skills book about six times and turned it into a 70-page summary. A classmate cut the summary down to 30 pages — and the material made the rounds among candidates. The criminology one later became a book.

It's the method he still recommends to his students today, as an instructor at a prep course for delegado candidates.

Your academy ranking decides where you work

Once approved, the candidate goes to the Police Academy (Acadepol). In his case, it was about nine months of investigator training, in a class of some 900 officers. At the end comes another detail that surprises anyone from the United States: assignments are picked by academy ranking, at a ceremony in the auditorium. The top graduate looks at the list of open slots and chooses; then number two, and so on. Maurício picked the 78th DP, the Jardins precinct, which covers the Avenida Paulista corridor — the financial heart of São Paulo.

And in California?

On this side, hiring also has several stages — written test, physical agility, oral interview, medical and psychological exams, background investigation — but each department runs its own process and many hire on a continuous basis. What's the same for everyone is in state law: Government Code section 1031 requires every California peace officer, among other things, to pass a thorough background investigation, a medical evaluation and a psychological evaluation. The standards for those stages are set by POST, the state Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. And assignment is generally the department's call, not the academy ranking's.

What the two of them think about it

In the episode, Eliel Teixeira and Edwin Wu talk with the guest about the prep, the background investigation and the sheer size of the São Paulo exam, and discuss how hiring works at departments in the Los Angeles area. The full conversation is in the episode.

Sources and verification

Brazilian Federal Law 12.830/2013 (art. 3: the delegado position is reserved for law graduates). São Paulo State Complementary Law 207/1979 (Organic Law of the São Paulo State Police). Official notices of the São Paulo Civil Police exams (Acadepol). California Government Code § 1031 (minimum standards for peace officers). California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST), selection standards (Background Investigation, psychological and medical evaluation). The number of applicants and passing candidates in the IP-08 exam, the scores and the length of the process are the guest's accounts, given from memory in the episode.

Who's talking here: Eliel Teixeira and Edwin Wu are active-duty police officers in the Los Angeles area, California — Brazilian-born, American citizens, with long careers in law enforcement. In this episode, produced in partnership with Criminal Cast, they host Maurício de Tomasi, a delegado with the São Paulo State Civil Police, a professor of criminology and criminal procedure and host of Criminal Cast.

Note: what's described here about American policing applies to California rules — and, in several points, to each host's specific department. Rules change in other U.S. states. What's described about Brazil applies to the São Paulo Civil Police; each Brazilian police force has its own organic law, exam notices and internal rules.