This is a Georgia Department of Corrections 38 Special, and it was sold new in the mid 1990's
You can understand why something like this would be issued to Security Guards and Prison Officer's. No safeties, fixed sights, probably never had any maintenance till I got it, it is just simple and straightforward to operate. Hard to have an accident with the thing unless you really tried. Hardly any training needed and no big muzzle blast if these people ever made it to a range.
When did major LEO, or small LEO, organizations require regular qualification and training? Reading some of the vintage writers, I don't believe that LEO prior to WW2 were required to qualify and train with their firearms. So, if the organization is not going to spend the time and money making their employees shoot, issuing a revolver in a low recoiling round makes sense. I was squadded next to a Police Chief of a major city at Camp Perry one year, he had to account for every bullet shot by his men in an encounter. He personally had the riot guns removed and replaced with 9mm carbines, because there were 12 buckshot he had to account for in every buckshot round.
Issuing LEO high capacity guns has had a back lash. People don't like finding out the number of shots Cops use in wrongful shootings. The round count has gone up considerably since the issuing of high capacity pistols. I don't think they mind so much when Cops shoot a bunch of holes in bad guys, but when they blast innocent people into shreds, it hits the front of magazines.
This incident has long been forgotten, but NYC Cops blasted a man reaching for his wallet. Killed him dead, dead, dead. The unfortunate was not armed with anything more dangerous than his identification and the extremely bad luck to run into a bunch of trigger happy Cops with high capacity weapons.