I got this in a email from a Baltimore Police Officer. I couldn’t say it better myself:
At the end of the day, I hope more officers will see your book as a vehicle to inform the academic community and public about the many challenges of policing in a poor urban environment. I think the average police officer will view the book more favorably if he understands he is not the book’s target audience.
Annie Linskey writes in the Sun. The full story is here.
City settles, calls supervisor a ‘law-abiding officer’
Two and a half years after allegations surfaced that an elite Baltimore police unit had become a rogue operation, the city did an about-face, agreeing yesterday to pay the squad’s supervisor a six-figure settlement and issuing a rare public apology, calling him “a law-abiding” and “dedicated” police officer.
The move was an extraordinary development in a probe into the Southwest District’s “flex squad” that began when a woman accused an officer of raping her in a police district station in late 2005. The police commissioner disbanded the squad, launched annual audits of flex squads citywide and suspended six officers, including three who were indicted on criminal charges.
Ultimately, one officer was acquitted of rape, criminal charges against others were dropped and the city is now paying $290,000 to Sgt. Robert L. Smith, former Officer Vicki Mengel and their attorney to settle a $1.5 million civil suit the accused officers had filed against the police department.
I was starting to think I was the only sane person in a crazy world. Then another email flew in over the transom:
I read the “real” first edition of your book, before the publisher recalled it for typographical errors. I mention this not because it confers upon me any particular credibility, but to highlight the point that I read the book quite some time ago and did not intend to share with you my critique of “Cop In the Hood.” That all changed after reading your exchange with the retired Eastern District commander.
I’m a veteran and don’t resent the fact you used the department to write a more informed piece of field research than you would have otherwise been able. I don’t think I’m a minority in this opinion. I’ve spoken with several other officers who have read the book – including some with whom you worked – and they don’t hold your relative inexperience against you either.
As you rightly stress in your responses to the retired commander, what matters is the content and structure of the book: Is it factually accurate? Do you support your conclusions with quality evidence? Do you bring a perspective that is lacking in existing scholarship on the subject? I could quibble with a few points here and there, but overall I think your book meets these criteria.
Those who disagree with the content of your book have an opportunity to write their own. Perhaps the retired commander, with all his experience and infinite wisdom, will write one himself. I’m confident that if he does, you will write a critique that addresses the content of the book rather than the content of his alleged character.
Regards,
[name omitted on request]
Lieutenant, BPD
Thanks, Lieutenant!
I received an email from a former commander of the Eastern District (he retired before I was there). He too refuses to read my book [everything below is edited and cut for length from the original emails]:
Your apparent motivation for writing your book would indicate that it was successful, you have your new profession, that of college professor; but then again, you didn’t really have law enforcement as your “old profession”, did you? Your book was obviously matter of expediency! What “real police” find offensive, is when interlopers such as yourself, apparently believe that a year on the street grants them some kind of miraculous wisdom to analyze, and be critical of, probably the most complex area of public service that exists today!
You see professor, police are special, very much so; they have conferred upon them an awesome, and totally unique responsibility, by the public that they serve, and that is the power to take a life!
Oh, our military can kill people, but only after they have an identifiable enemy, and in today’s military, after the legal advisor who is deployed with them, grants them the permission to do so! But our police, they make split-second decisions, decisions that may see them taking a human life, and there are no advisors deployed with them, nor is the “enemy” often readily identifiable! No one, and I mean no one, in our society, has that awesome power; not the well over paid Congress, the activist judges, nor the President himself!
And professor, that is why your book upsets real police; there is a sort of snobbish effrontery to every working police officer, when some opportunist such as yourself, exploits a mere year of service, converting it in some way to confer expertise on his puny observations, which were subsequently recorded for future use and gain!
In order to truly legitimize your book, you would have needed to spend much more time on those streets in the Eastern, but then, that would have interfered with your future employment schedule, wouldn’t it? Do you still wonder why your book is resented?
[signed]
Major (retired) BCPD
Dear Major ,
I just composed an honest but rude email to you. Because you were a major, I respect you. I want to get your permission before sending it to you. It’s nothing personal, but it’s a bit rude. I think you can take it.
Here’s my polite response:
I think you misunderstand me as some anti-cop academic. Nothing could be further from the truth (well, except the academic part). I respect and honor every police officer to ever wear the BPD uniform. Especially the patrol officer. My book is dedicated to those who have died in service! And you dare criticize?
I speak for the underappreciated patrol officer riding around right now in the Eastern District (and Western District, and other districts like it, if there are any). I never pretend or claim to know more than people with the experience of you. But really, how can a respond to criticism if you have no idea what I have to say?
I’ll tell you what: can I send you a copy of my book? On me. You don’t even have to buy it. Like a gift. That’s right, you can make me spend my own money to buy my own damn book and mail the damn thing to you (I’ll just have it shipped from Amazon——please don’t think I get them for free). Just because you have the balls to write me.
But I’ll tell you what: if you like my book or not, you have to write me and tell me what you honestly think. That’s the deal. That’s your duty. And I’ll post it on my blog. And one more condition: if you actually enjoy reading my book, or think there’s something of worth in it, then I want a check from you for the $25 cover price.
Peter
Dear Professor Moskos,
First of all, the question about the “reduction” in homicides while I commanded the Eastern; to be quite honest, since my retirement in 1995, which was several years after my assignment as the Eastern District Commander, I honestly do not recall that statistic; however, in deference to you, I must admit that there probably was no reduction!
There is very little that police can do to reduce the rate of occurrence of homicides: every minute of every day, presents an opportunity to commit these crimes, there simply are not enough police officers to significantly impact the opportunity to commit homicide! Most crimes of passion homicides are committed inside, and between people who know each other; there is very little likelihood that police officers will be present to prevent these!
Oh yes, good police officers know who “the bad guys” are where they patrol, and yes, they know which ones have a homicidal proclivity also, but that prevents nothing! I will wager, that if we would “allow” police to make preemptive arrests of known violent criminals, many homicides would be prevented, but that is not the case, is it? Police experience and intuition, and yes that “gut feeling” that goes with being a true professional, if unleashed, could prevent a lot of crime, including homicides, but that would be violative of someone’s rights, wouldn’t it?
Now for that “rude” response that you prepared for me; I say have at it, I have been called things that I would be willing to bet that you have never even heard, even during your extensive time on the streets of the Great Eastern District!
Dear [Major],
I just find it amazing that you think so much about me without having a clue as to who I am or what I stand for.
My book isn’t about being a sergeant. Or a major. Or anything but being a lowly patrol officer of the midnight shift in the Eastern.
What does strike a nerve is when you imply or say I wasn’t a real police officer. That does bother me. You wouldn’t tell a soldier he wasn’t a veteran because he “only” served 2 years, would you?
You can say I wasn’t a police officer for long. True. Or that I would know a lot more had a stayed on the force for longer. Very True. But while I was there, I was a damn good police officer risking my life every damn night for my brothers and sisters in blue and also for the worthless scum of the Eastern District (and, oh yeah, the good citizens, too).
I’ll be back in Baltimore this very weekend. Eating crabs at my sergeant’s church with him a bunch of my former squadmates. You know what, they criticize me too. But I can take it from them because they know me. They also risked their lives for me and know I did the same.
My offer still stands, by the way. I’ll buy you a book if you want. If you don’t read my book, I don’t have more to say. You can be a fool and criticize me for what you think I stand for, or we can have an intelligent discussion about what I wrote and what police can do, if anything, to prevent crime.
Anyway, here’s what I wrote last night. The “rude” letter. Looking over it again, it’s not so bad. So I call you an asshole and a fool and full of shit. I know you’ve been called far worse.
Dear [Major],
I don’t wonder why my book is resented. Because in truth, it’s not. No cop who was read the damn thing resents it. Only people who believe what they read in the “liberal media” (frankly, I’m surprised you read The Sun) have something against me. You’re full of shit.
Why don’t you just read the damn thing (my book, that is, not The Sun) and then bitch? A man who condemns something about which he knows nothing is at best ignorant. And also perhaps a great fool. Consider that.
I wasn’t a cop for long. But at least I earned my chops the tough way.
Frankly, sir, and forgive my bluntness: I think you’re an asshole. But you know what, I’ll forgive you, because I can be an asshole myself. And hell, some of my best friends are assholes. But at least I had the common courtesy to read what you wrote.
What I give in my book is an honest portrayal of what it was like to be a patrol officer in the Eastern District for over a year. Nothing more. Nothing less. You got a problem with that? Write your own damn book.
Peter
Or so says the BBC. It’s not a bullet-proof bra. It’s a bra designed not be dangerous when combined with the impact of a bullet on body armor. But I do love the fact it says “police” on the bottom.
It is being dubbed the new “bullet-proof bra”, a new kind of Wonderbra which could help protect thousands of women police officers here in Germany.
It may sound like a joke, but this is a serious matter – the policewoman who came up with the idea said normal bras can be dangerous when worn in combination with a bullet-proof vest.
“The impact of a bullet can push the metal and plastic bits of the bra into an officer’s body, causing serious injury,” said Carmen Kibat, an adviser on equal opportunities for the Hamburg-based Bundespolizei – Germany’s federal police force. “
Read the whole story here.
Very little is known (or has been written) about rural cops. Certainly I’m very guilty of an urban bias.
This could be the man to inform us. He’s planning on writing. I’ll encourage him.
More good stuff:
For the past nine months I have been pushing a sled in one of the poorest and most isolated rural counties in ****. (I also spent five months working as a reserve officer in an urban police department.) I absolutely love being a cop. It has many dull moments but wearing the badge is like having a backstage pass into people’s lives.
Working as a rural deputy is often less glamorous than that of urban cops (especially in light of shows like “The Wire”). But it has its own peculiar challenges. I work in a socially, economically, and (importantly) geographically isolated county. My first fight occurred on the top of a mountain at a meth lab explosion. My cover was twenty- five minutes away. Most of my peers in urban departments have never and will likely never find themselves in that kind of situation.[You can say that again!] I often find myself in the position of a general practitioner. I conduct my investigations from the time I am dispatched till court, since investigators are scant and reserved only for violent felonies. As a deputy I am also a coroner. I have investigated three murders and three suicides in the past nine months.
Most of my colleagues and my favorite sergeants find the 911 dispatch system and the idea of random patrol to be policies and practices out of touch with the reality of the services we can provide. I drive two-to-three hundred miles a night In the process of covering my beats as a result of these systems (ironically high gas prices are forcing the department to think about patrol in a new light). The deputies, among themselves, discuss a response system based on that of Fire & Rescue.
I have finally come to the point where I am no longer the Fucking New Guy on the force and have become largely accepted by colleagues, especially my sergeants and some of the older cops (consisting of crusty **** cops from the 80’s, former truck drivers, and an ex-high school teacher). Although still green, I am not constantly confronted by situations that leave me perplexed as to what I am to do.
I received this email a while back from a Baltimore Cop who transferred elsewhere. I’m protected his identity (of course) by blocking out a few details with ****. (By the way, I think the “proper” spelling of “screet” is with a K, but that’s a minor issue.) This is good stuff. perhaps even better than my book:
Much like a person’s upbringing in life influences some of their behavior and personality, my training, or “upbringing” as a cop, if you will, in Baltimore will continually influence how I police. I find myself very different from many of my current co-workers. I am more jaded and uncompassionate. I want every suspect to go to jail (which rarely happens here in ****).
Thug life and the ghetto is another aspect of Baltimore I will never forget. Again, I grew up in **** and graduated with 5 or so African Americans out of 225. Not much contact. However, after 4 years in Baltimore, I am fluent in “ghettoese” (p62). “Peoples” “Hair-ron” “bounce” “up the screet” “on the corna” and “hoppers” are among my favorites.
In regards to the ghetto, from my * years in Baltimore, I agree with the thought (p39) about not blaming poverty and racism for the ghetto life and wanting to “napalm the whole area” (I wish I had a dollar every time I heard that). It was hard as a white upper-middle class conservative male to feel sorry for African Americans there, but in the same light, I agree with the “hate everybody philosophy”(p40). My partner (white male) and I, knew when we saw a white junkie in the ghetto, they were getting locked up for something. Fair or not, that is how I played the game.
One of the thoughts I am in agreement with many of the other officer’s in the book is the negative opinion of “junkies.” Drugs never had an impact on anyone in my family, any of my friends family growing up, or for that matter even in our community (it was unheard of). I took that with me to Baltimore. I was naive, but also cold and uncompassionate, and to this day I still am.
My opinion of junkies (pp43-46) is that they are, “not even considered people … Who gives a flying fuck about a junkie!?” (My wife actually got mad at me during the reading of the book because I continually interjected my thoughts about this issue: “****, you are not in Baltimore anymore, let it go,” she says). It’s difficult to let it go, especially when you experience it firsthand and are so disgusted with it. I will never forget stopping a male junkie (Pennsylvania Avenue market, heroin shop), telling him to give me his tools, whereby he proceeded to bend over, spread his butt cheeks and show me a capped needle shoved into his anus. And people wonder how I got to be so bitter.
Departmentally, I found your thoughts and opinions on point. Without a doubt, there is an unwritten quota at work. In flex it never bothered me because I locked a lot of people up, but regardless, we still heard about having to beat the other flex and bike squads in stats. During the latter part of my career in Baltimore, officers were temporarily transferred to other districts as punishment for poor stats. Yeah, that makes sense, send a poor producing officer to an unfamiliar district and ask them to produce. Command staff, you are genius!
District and Circuit Court was a joke. Officer’s working until 3 or 4 am and then expected to be in court by 9am. And they wonder why officer’s FTA’d[failure to appear].I had court 5 days a week sometimes. I was never one for overtime; I wanted my free time. Talk about burnout. Court was one of the top reasons I wanted to leave Baltimore after my four years.
I could write a lot more about the book, but I think it would be easier to just say I am in agreement with your thoughts about Baltimore policing, and leave it simply at that. I recommend this book to people curious about “real”(?) police work!
…Reading your blog about the book certainly reminded me of my own experiences. I’m sure you knew you’d get criticism from salty old veterans who think it takes 20 years of driving in circles for 8 hours a day to figure out the streets… but I agree with you, it doesn’t.
There’s a good story in today’s Baltimore Sun by Annie Linskey about me, my book, and current crime reduction efforts in Baltimore.
When I talked to this reporter, I could see that she’s a thinking woman who cares about her story. Plus she’s got a solid track record of good pieces. Well done.
This just came flying over the transom from a police officer:
I just wanted to let you know I finishedCop in the Hoodlast night at work (Don’t tell the chief . . . it was a slow night for a change). I must say it was quite different than I expected, mainly because it was more analytical than I thought it would be. Your book certainly gives great insight for an outsider into what police work is all about, particularly relating to street-level drug dealing.
I also found it interesting that your perceptions of law enforcement are quite similar those of myself and my co-workers, despite the fact you spent a relatively short time on the streets. I guess it doesn’t take long to figure it all out, does it? I was also happy to hear that you view law enforcement officers as largely non-corrupt. That gives me hope that the public perception, at large, is not as bad as I may think. Overall, I found your book to be a very informative read.
I have a couple questions
1.) You’re an obviously well-educated person. I am curious how different police work was to experience than what you expected it might be?
2.) Were you on the streets long enough to develop the raw cynicism which is so ingrained in most urban cops?
1) I really didn’t have many expectations, strange as that sounds. Yeah, I went to good colleges, but it’s not like I was a stranger to work. I think the biggest surprise was the that the standards of integrity and professionalism in the Baltimore City Police Department were much higher than I expected (and, I can’t help but noting, higher than I find in the academic world). I think TV and movies areto blame for people assuming police culture is corrupt.
2) I’ve always been both a cynic and also an optimist. I think it’s being the former that lets me remain being the latter. I don’t think I was there long enough to get that really hard core raw cynicism. Maybe I never would have. But if that hard core cynicism is related to burn out (and I suspect it is), then yes, if I had to patrol the same streets for another 18 years, I would have been as cynical and burned out as any cop could be.