Raccoon City Police Department: the R.P.D. Building, Chief Irons and the Fall of 1998

The Raccoon City Police Department, usually shortened to R.P.D., is the police force of Raccoon City, and its headquarters is the police station where Leon S. Kennedy and Claire Redfield spend the first half of Resident Evil 2. The building is a converted art museum, which explains its marble hall, statues and endless locked doors, and in September 1998 it became the last stand of the city's police against the t-Virus outbreak. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019); Resident Evil Outbreak File #2)

Why the R.P.D. building is an old museum#

The police station started life as an art museum. The department bought the building and converted it into its headquarters, keeping much of what was already there: the grand main hall with its goddess statue, the clock tower, the galleries and the ducts that once controlled the air for the artworks. Files in Resident Evil Outbreak File #2 spell out the history. (Resident Evil Outbreak File #2)

That history is the in-world excuse for the station's puzzles. Statues hold medallions, rooms are sealed with keys marked by playing card suits, and secret passages wait behind the art. Chief Irons added to the collection with expensive pieces of his own, paid for, it later turns out, with Umbrella money. The 2019 remake rebuilt the station in full detail and kept its museum bones. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019))

Chief Brian Irons and Umbrella#

Brian Irons ran the R.P.D. in 1998, and he was Umbrella's man. Files in the station show him taking regular payments from the company to keep his officers away from its business. When S.T.A.R.S. came back from the Spencer Mansion in July 1998 with stories of monsters and illegal research, Irons made sure nobody acted on them and had the unit suspended. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019); Resident Evil 3: Nemesis)

He was worse than corrupt. His office is full of hunting trophies and taxidermy, and the games make clear he had moved on to human victims. When Claire meets him in Resident Evil 2 he is armed and unstable, and he has just killed the mayor's daughter. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019))

Irons dies at the hands of William Birkin, who has injected himself with the G-virus. In the 1998 game he is attacked in a hidden room under the station, and a G embryo bursts out of his chest. In the remake he drags Sherry Birkin to the city orphanage and is caught there by Birkin, with the same result. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019))

How the R.P.D. fell in September 1998#

When the t-Virus spread through Raccoon City, the station opened its doors to fleeing civilians and its officers tried to hold the streets. Operation reports left in the building tell what happened next. Irons ordered the weapons locker emptied and the guns spread around the building, which left officers short of ammunition. A large force, including S.W.A.T., went out to meet the zombies head-on and was wiped out. The ones left inside were attacked again and again, first by zombies and then by the creatures they named Lickers. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil Outbreak File #2)

Jill Valentine visits the station on 28 September in the 1999 version of Resident Evil 3, is attacked at its gates by Nemesis and finds the building almost empty. In the 2020 remake it's Carlos Oliveira who goes in instead, and he finds the wounded Lieutenant Marvin Branagh still holding out. (Resident Evil 3: Nemesis; Resident Evil 3 (2020))

What happens at the R.P.D. in Resident Evil 2#

Leon, a rookie due to start work that day, and Claire, looking for her brother Chris, reach the station on the night of 29 September. Branagh, bitten and fading, tells Leon to find a way out. The station is still full of the remains of the battle. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019))

• Leon meets Ada Wong, who is searching for the journalist Ben Bertolucci, locked in the cells below. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019))
• Claire finds Sherry Birkin, who has been hiding in the station's vents. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019))
• A Tyrant, the T-103 known as Mr. X, is dropped at the station to recover the G-virus and kill anyone left. In the remake it stalks the halls for much of the game. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019))
• William Birkin, now a monster, attacks the survivors as they find a way down through the parking garage and the sewers to Umbrella's lab. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil 2 (2019))

The station was badly damaged when the government destroyed Raccoon City on 1 October 1998, but its shell survived. (Resident Evil Requiem)

The R.P.D. in Resident Evil Requiem and the films#

In Resident Evil Requiem, set in 2026, the ruined station is back. Leon returns to it decades after his one night on the job and finds it wrecked and abandoned, and a new Tyrant hunts him through the building just as Mr. X once did. (Resident Evil Requiem)

On film, Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City (2021) recreates the station closely, with Leon as the rookie, Chief Irons in charge and the building overrun in one night. See Welcome to Raccoon City explained. (Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City)