With 1,817 officers and 525 civilian staff as of 2020, covering an area of 438 square miles (1,130 km2) with a population of 1,000,000+, it is the largest police department between Washington, D.C., and Atlanta, Georgia.

[6] On September 13, 2013, 23-year-old Jonathan Ferrell was shot ten times and killed by Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department Officer Randall Kerrick, after Ferrell's car broke down and he had knocked on a person's door for help in the early hours of the morning.

[7] The shooting of Keith Lamont Scott, a 43-year-old African American man, occurred on the afternoon of September 20, 2016, in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Plainclothes police officers arrived at an apartment complex about a mile from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte to search for another man for whom they had outstanding warrants.

Officer Brentley Vinson (a Black African American & two-year veteran of the police force) fatally shot Scott; he has been placed on paid administrative leave.

The shooting occurred in the parking lot of the Village at College Downs apartment complex on Old Concord Road, where CMPD officers were searching for an unrelated suspect with outstanding warrants.

The officers then allegedly gave Scott numerous loud verbal warnings to drop his weapon, which many witnesses at the scene heard.

[10][11] CMPD Chief Kerr Putney told reporters that a handgun was seized at the scene, and a photo of the gun was released by WBTV.

[2] Breakdown of the makeup of the rank and file of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department:[13] CMPD officers are issued the Glock 17.