Well...in my town...the sheriff just drives around doing barely anything...and seems to call in the other guys when he takes down a license plate...so half the town sees that you've been pulled over...and it looks more like a drug bust than speeding....speaking from experience.

Good morning avallach. It is different in some areas, but typically, the police handle traffic and domestic problems inside of a city limit, whereas the Sheriff and his deputies handle most duties in the rural areas. In our neighborhoods, (and county) The Sheriff is not responsible for traffic duties (unless he sees something flagrantly dangerous). The state highway patrol takes care of most of the traffic duties so that the Sheriff can free up resources for drug interdiction, violence investigation, major theft, and serious traffic accidents. Long story short in our communities: The police and the highway patrol handle traffic and civil matters. The Sheriff handles criminal activities. I live in the meth capital of the world, so our Sheriff's department stays really busy. They bust 3 - 4 labs per week.

Many people have answered this question, and most people are only answering part of it. Tradidionally a Sheriff's Office (or department) does more than a police department. A police Department patrols a city and provides law-enforcement for the city. They answer calls for service, do detective work, traffic, write police reports, and generally are the crime fighters for their particular city. A police department is run by a chief of police, who is usually appointed by the mayor. A Sheriff's Department is a county agency. The Sheriff is an elected official. The Sheriff is responsible for the courts (bailiffs), the county jail, civil processes, evictions, and also providing patrol and law-enforcement services to unicorporated areas of the county. In most states police officers and sheriff deputies all have the same "peace officer" powers. As far as the public is concerned police officers and sheriff deputies should be looked on as the same, as both are peace officers. The simple definition most people are giving is that police are city and sheriff is county. But there are also "campus police" who work for a college but are fully sworn peace officers and can enforce the law anywhere in their state.