Our criminal justice system favors defendants who know how to play the "5K game": criminals who are so savvy about the cooperation process that they repeatedly commit serious crimes knowing they can be sent back to the streets if they simply cooperate with prosecutors. In Snitch, investigative reporter Ethan Brown shows through a compelling series of case profiles how the sentencing guidelines for drug-related offenses, along with the 5K1.1 section, have unintentionally created a "cottage industry of cooperators," and led to fabricated evidence. The result is wrongful convictions and appallingly gruesome crimes, including the grisly murder of the Harvey family in Richmond, Virginia and the well-publicized murder of Imette St. Guillen in New York City. This cooperator-coddling criminal justice system has ignited the infamous "Stop Snitching" movement in urban neighborhoods, deplored by everyone from the NAACP to the mayor of Boston for encouraging witness intimidation. But as Snitch shows, the movement is actually a cry against the harsh sentencing guidelines for drug-related crimes, and a call for hustlers to return to "old school" street values, like: do the crime, do the time. Combining deep knowledge of the criminal justice system with frontline true crime reporting, Snitch is a shocking and brutally troubling report about the state of American justice when it's no longer clear who are the good guys and who are the bad.

Snitch! offers a vivid account of how some citizens actively assist state surveillance by "informing" on others.

Convinced he has a greater chance to die–of boredom–at his desk job than he ever faced in narcotics, Las Vegas police sergeant Ron Yeager agrees to slip off the retirement track long enough to head up an undercover task force designed to combat the recent surge in auto thefts. Then he meets his inexperienced team of officers, most of whom seem completely incapable of infiltrating the seamy underbelly of Sin City. In particular, Mackenzie “Mack” Hazard’s determination to wear her faith like a badge threatens to send Yeager’s blood pressure skyrocketing. And then there’s maverick Jesse Lunden, who thinks he’s learned all he needs to know in his three years of undercover work. As Yeager gambles his reputation on transforming this group of egos and eccentrics into a force to be reckoned with, he stumbles onto a much bigger scheme than anyone expected. This could be the showstopper of their careers–if his back doesn’t give out first. This second book in the Occupational Hazards series blends wacky characters, sincere faith, and surprising plot twists into one hilariously addictive read.

When a police raid goes wrong, the fallout is deadly Nick Manaris is a promising detective, but he’s lost his love for the job. After years wading through the worst the city has to offer, life as a cop has begun to feel like torture. Assigned to work with slick detective Sonny McCabe and his gang of cowboys, Nick knows he’s gotten in over his head. Sonny believes a gang of Cubans has come to an agreement with the Mafia, trading guns for drugs, and he wants to nip their alliance in the bud. He convinces Nick to get them a warrant for a raid, and the result is tragic. The information given by Sonny’s snitch is wrong, and the raid turns into a bloody mess. With two cops and a host of suspects dead, Nick and his fellow officers are marked for revenge—and their lives are about to get a whole lot worse.

Amid a background of bank robberies and fatal gunshot wounds, the real drama here is bureaucratic and human. In her response to the adversity all around her, Peter Plate’s Charlene Hassler, a social worker at the huge, anthill-like Department of Social Services complex on San Francisco’s Otis Street, is a literary tour de force. Straight out of Dante’s Inferno, Plate’s DSS is an eternal holding pen of unfulfilled needs and desires. Charlene is under investigation, and snitches are everywhere. A co-worker is murdered. Charlene’s boss and former mentor spends amorous afternoons with her arch-enemy. The custodian burglarizes her desk, then shoots her in the knee after he imagines she’s ratted on him. As the anger and chaos at DSS reach epic proportions, we witness the strange heroism of Charlene’s coworkers when they foil a hold-up; her boss’s real vulnerability after a suicide attempt; and Charlene herself triumphantly winning her personal battle for romance in this true human comedy.

"First published over ten years ago, Snitching has become known as the "informant bible," a leading text for advocates, attorneys, journalists, and scholars. This updated edition contains a decade worth of new stories, new data, new legislation and legal developments, much of it generated by the book itself and by Natapoff's own work"--

Blood is thicker than water! Every grimy hustler will express those words when they are out on the block chasing the bag. But when Flash’s back is up against the wall and he’s being pressured by homicide detectives, all sense of loyalty goes out the window. Flash, the son of Philadelphia drug queen pin Vickie Lopez, decides he isn't going to prison, not even for his own mother. When he’s arrested for a small amount of cocaine, he spills his guts to Philadelphia homicide detectives, resulting in the arrest and federal conviction, under the RICO Act, of his own mother. She’s staring down a life sentence. As the clock winds down on the deal he cut with the Feds, Flash is shipped to Graterford, one of the harshest prisons in the state of Pennsylvania. His baby brother, who is North Philly’s most notorious contract killer, awaits him for a family reunion. With nowhere to run, Flash is forced to lay in the bed he made for himself. His past has finally come back to haunt him. Will his brother make him pay the ultimate price for betraying their mother, or will he forgive him for his sin?