We Own This City

I read this after watching We Own This City on HBO, so I skipped some of the stuff on Jenkins' early years, I really just wanted to see what the TV show left out, but it turns out the show hewed pretty closely to the book. I'm glad I watched the show first because I was able to keep all of the players straight in my head by picturing the actors who played them. Between this, the show, and the documentary, The Slow Hustle, which focuses on Sean Suiters death, (and The Wire) I'm convinced I never need to go to Baltimore again.

Quick impressions: This book tells the story in gory details of one of the largest police corruption and crime scandals of the 21st century. Baltimore Police Department Sergeant Wayne Jenkins and his elite Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF) were hailed as heroes for, supposedly, helping get illegal guns and drugs off Baltimore streets. In reality, Jenkins and his crew were nothing more than thugs and thieves with badges who robbed people, stole drugs from drug dealers, which they then resold for profit, planted fake evidence to send innocent people to jail, and that's just the tip of the iceberg. For years, they committed their crimes with impunity, protected by neglectful and at times incompetent supervisors who either should have known better or just turned a blind eye.


(Full review on my blog later)