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Acting Deputy Chief Police Officer Paula Hudson
A/Assistant Commissioner Paula Hudson is the Deputy Chief Police Officer for ACT Policing, providing strategic leadership and expert advice to the Chief Police Officer. She oversees the Operations and Investigations Commands, as well as Employee Welfare, ensuring operational excellence and a strong organisational culture.
With more than 30 years of distinguished service, A/Assistant Commissioner Hudson has demonstrated extensive leadership across community policing, transnational investigations, international operations, and national security investigations. Her senior appointments within the Australian Federal Police (AFP) include leadership roles in Counter Terrorism, International Operations, Criminal Asset Confiscation, and at the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation.
Promoted to Commander in 2021, she led Transnational Operations within Crime Command, spearheading efforts to dismantle the most significant organised crime syndicates. She was instrumental in advancing the AFP’s National Strategy to Fight Transnational Serious and Organised Crime, directing key programs such as the AFP Drug Strategy, Offshore Disruption Operations targeting High Value Targets, and complex investigations into Encrypted Criminal Communication platforms.
Among her recent notable achievements, A/Assistant Commissioner Hudson led Operation KRAKEN, a global investigation into the GhostECC encrypted communications platform, driving operational success through trusted international and domestic partnerships and cross-command collaboration. She was also instrumental in the leadership, design and implementation of the new business construct; the Commonwealth Agencies Operations Centre (CAOC), which has significantly enhanced the national coordination for border-controlled drug detections through an integrated, end-to-end national coordination center which links offshore efforts to onshore responses through rapid, unified communication for all Australian law enforcement agencies.
A/Assistant Commissioner Hudson’s career highlights includes a four-year posting as AFP Police Liaison Officer to Vietnam and three years as the Law Enforcement Liaison Officer to the Minister for Justice, the Hon. Michael Keenan, at Australian Parliament House (2016–2019) and her foundational career began in ACT Policing where she served in General Duties, Criminal Investigations, Homicide and the Sexual Assault & Child Abuse Teams and was designated detective while in ACT Policing.
A/Assistant Commissioner Hudson is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Police Management’s Strategic Command Program and the Australian Institute of Company Directors. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Justice, Intelligence and National Security Studies, and in 2020 was awarded the prestigious Cambridge University Wakefield Scholarship for postgraduate studies in Applied Criminology and Police Management.