[2] Succeeding William J. Flynn, Dougherty reported directly to Police Commissioner James Church Cropsey who would later become a New York State Supreme Court Justice.

A strict disciplinarian, he exerted considerable control over his men and was responsible for "shaking up" the bureau on several occasions: he also led raids on a number of illegal gambling establishments, arresting the crime boss Giosue Gallucci,[3] and, in one incident, used axes to force their way in.

[1] When Herman Rosenthal was gunned down in front of the Hotel Metropole on July 16, 1912, then District Attorney Charles S. Whitman accused the police department of making little effort to apprehend the gunmen.

[1] Prior to leaving the police force, Dougherty led a detective squad which apprehended over a hundred gangsters within a 24-hour period in the aftermath of a gunbattle in which city court clerk Frederick Strauss had been shot and killed.

In his later years, he advocated the deportation of immigrants convicted of a criminal offense, the elimination of the revolver through federal legislation, a bounty payment to killers of hold-up men and the restoration of the whipping post as punishment for first-time offenders.