Justice & Police Museum

Step into the dark side of Sydney’s past with a visit to the Water Police station and courts that once made up one of the city’s busiest legal hubs.

Crooks and cops, thugs and judges, locals and drifters, the guilty and the innocent have all left their stories here. The Justice and Police Museum was originally the Water Police Court (1856), Water Police Station (1858) and the Police Court (1885). The elegant sandstone complex was once one of the busiest legal and policing precincts in NSW, with thousands of Sydneysiders passed through its doors right up until 1985.

With its 1890s holding cells, offices, charge room and courts, the Museum draws you into a world of crime, punishment and policing, from bushrangers, sly grog and razor gangs to forensics. You can see Captain Moonlite’s death mask, Ben Hall’s pistol or hear of Constable Walker’s duel to the death with the legendary Thunderbolt. Or you can inspect forensic evidence from notorious crimes such as the Pyjama Girl Murder.

Take an inside look at crime scenes in the forensic photography display or see an array of spine-chilling weapons confiscated from the many criminals that came through the courts.