“The truth of a time and place is, of course, always illusive; but no historian can tell the story of Miami in the last decade without acknowledging one gigantic fact of municipal life: cocaine.”
Patrolman Phil Caruso and lawyer Richard Hartman built the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association into an arrogant, insular, and wealthy institution that stands above the law and beyond scrutiny. Where is the $63 million a year in tax funds and union dues going? Only their friends know for sure.
“In a city where the death penalty has been perhaps the most controversial public issue for a decade, cop bullets killed 39 people last year. Two hundred have died this way since Ed Koch became mayor in 1978”
“By 3 a.m. Tuesday the liberals had been routed at the convention, the kids had been repulsed on the street ... Almost every noise was martial: fire sirens, the squawking of radios, cop cars racing, the idle chatter of police on duty”
“They were in Harlem because they were the toughest guys the department could find, and it appeared that if anyone could take care of themselves, and me as well, it would be the people in Sixth Homicide.”
