True Crime & Justice

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Nonterrorism related officer deaths are below those in the 1970s, when an average of more than 200 officers died annually in the line of duty according to Craig Floyd, chairman of the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund in Washington.

"Fewer police are being killed in the line of duty than there were 30 years ago, we've got more police on the street than we've ever had. They have better training and they're no longer outgunned by the criminals."

9,000 US law enforcement agencies reveal:

• They are most likely to be shot to death by a handgun.
• Nights are the most dangerous time.
• Fridays are the most dangerous days.
• Sunday is the least violent.
• The South leads the nation with 281 officer deaths since 1992. In 2001, 28 were in the South.
• 2/3rds of cop killers had prior criminal records or arrests.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science presented a mathematical model that predicts the likelihood that a police force can conquer a new drug market or end a rash of burglaries. Treating criminal behavior as a deterministic system they created equations, based on Los Angeles Police Department data, that describe the movement of neighborhood crime.

Law Enforcement Statistics Bureau of Justice Statistics

Offenses Known To Police Bureau of Justice Statistics

Law Enforcement Publications National Criminal Justice Reference Services

What is Community Policing? US Dept of Justice

US Supreme Court MIRANDA v. ARIZONA, 384 U.S. 436 (1966)

FBI Central Records System Classification Codes correspond to the first three numbers of any FBI file and are used to designate the type of investigation. Thus, an FBI file that began with the number 007 would indicate that the file was created as part of a Kidnapping investigation.

Preliminary Seminannual UCR FBI preliminary figures indicate law enforcement agencies reported an increase of 3.7 percent in the number of violent crimes in the first half of 2006 compared to the first six months of 2005. The violent crime category includes murder, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault. Property crimes from January to June of 2006 decreased 2.6 percent compared to 2005. Property crimes include burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft. Data for arson are not included in property crime. 2006 figures indicate arson increased 6.8 percent in the first half of the year compared to 2005.

National Geographic Goes Inside the FBI

In 1928 Justice Louis D. Brandeis made a prediction that the government may find ways to reproduce documents in court without removing them from "private drawers." Such methods, he warned, will expose "the most intimate occurrences of the home."

Miles Corwin, a reporter, spent the summer of 1994 shadowing a pair of homicide detectives as they investigated their share of the 400-plus killings that bloodied the streets of gang-infested South-central Los Angeles that year.

Police departments stress the importance of relationships between police departments and residents. This considers web sites in terms of value and usefulness to citizens, achieving department informational goals, and identifiying the essentials of a police department web site.

A Shadow in the City: Confessions of an Undercover Drug Warrior by Charles Bowden -- Joey O'Shay is not the real name of the narcotics agent in an unnamed city in the center of the country. But Joey O'Shay exists. The nearly three hundred drug busts he has orchestrated over more than two decades are real, too; if the drug war were a declared war, O'Shay would have a Silver Star. With nerves and mastery worthy of his subject, Charles Bowden follows O'Shay as he sets in motion his latest conquest, a $50 million heroin deal that originates in Colombia and has federal agents sitting at attention from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C., to New York City. As it unfolds, O'Shay reveals the unerring instinct and ceaseless vigilance that have led him through minefields and brought down kingpins. But now they have led him to a place where it isn't so clear who the heroes are or what the fight has been for. And still the warrior fights on, in a murky and unforgiving landscape readers will not be able to forget.

Jihad In Brooklyn: The NYPD Raid That Stopped America's First Suicide Bombers -- New York has always been a mecca for immigrants, including an Egyptian dishwasher living in a cramped Brooklyn apartment he shared with three other Middle-Eastern men. But on July 31, 1997, the last place he wanted to be was home, where two of his roommates-young, angry Palestinians-were proudly showing off the bomb belts they planned to detonate on a packed rush-hour subway train. Barely able to stifle his panic, the Egyptian told two policemen his story. Within minutes, they were in a Brooklyn precinct house, and the NYPD's famous Emergency Services Unit was on their way. The brave men of the NYPD ESU staged a daring 5 AM raid on the sweltering, filthy tenement apartment, stopping the terrorists- who literally had their fingers on the switches of the bombs. Hundreds-perhaps thousands-of lives were saved. This is their frightening, true story.

Public Enemies: Americas Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the Fbi, 1933-34 Bryan Burrough strips away myths put out by J. Edgar Hoover's FBI to tell the full story of the most spectacular crime wave in American history, the two-year battle between Hoover and John Dillinger, Machine Gun Kelly, Bonnie and Clyde, Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, and the Barkers. In 1933, police jurisdictions ended at state lines, the FBI was in its infancy, and fast cars and machine guns were easily available. It was a great time to be a bank robber. Burrough unearthed an extraordinary amount of new material revealing many fascinating interconnections in the vast underworld ecosystem that stretched from Texas up to Minnesota. But the real-life connections were insignificant next to the sense of connectedness J. Edgar Hoover worked to create in the mind of the American public-using the "Great Crime Wave" to gain the position of untouchable power he would occupy for almost half a century.

The Brass Wall: The Betrayal of Undercover Detective In 1993, Vincent Armanti, Undercover Detective #4126, agreed to infiltrate the branch of the Luchese family responsible for the homicide of a beloved fireman. Already a legend for his past undercover work, Armanti transformed himself into Vinnie "Blue Eyes" Penisi-a veteran hood with an icy stare. Then he found out that the wise guys had access to classified police information. When the leak was revealed to be the son of the commander of NYPD's Internal Affairs Bureau, IAB detectives compromised Armanti again and again to protect the powerful man's son. But Armanti stayed on the job, even when it was clear his life was in danger. Here, in all his humanity, is an unforgettable hero, battling for his honor and survival. Here, with all its compromises, is the city of New York. Here is a remarkable story that ranks with the great police classics.

City Confidential: Paradise Valley The town isn't much more than a bar, trailer park and a couple hundred miles of painted desert. But in 1980, Paradise Valley was thrust into the national spotlight following the murder of two game wardens. The events that led up the murders and the manhunt that followed, which saw a man named Claude Dallas targeted by local, state and federal authorities. In a tapestry of contemporary accounts, interviews with the officers who searched for Dallas, testimony from those who knew him, and extensive footage. What emerges is a portrait of a man willing to take any risk to avoid going to jail, and one whose occupation and attitude has made him a folk hero to some, despite the crimes he committed. On the edge of nowhere, a small town obtained a measure of fame from a saga that calls to mind frontier times.

San Francisco Vice -- Policing morality has always been problematic in law enforcement. And in San Francisco, where morality and related laws shift constantly, it is more complicated. In the 1950's it was illegal to serve a known homosexual alcohol. In the '90s, there are clubs where people dress up as slaves and pay for the privilege of a whipping and it is legal. In a shocking look at the world of pimps, prostitutes and bookies detective Sue Rolovich snares Johns by impersonating a streetwalker. Listen in with surveillance teams as pimps talk about their women and the "victimless" crime they pursue. Ride along on busts and stakeouts, and hear stories from the officers who patrol the seedy underside of society.