The true story of war hero and prohibition lawman Steve Lawson. September 21, 1922 is a fateful one for Constable Lawson of the Alberta Provincial Police. The force is charged with stopping the illegal importation of liquor into the province. After an ill-fated run-in with police the rum runners confront Lawson at his office and home in Coleman in the Crowsnest Pass. There is a brief scuffle, shots are fired and the unarmed officer falls to the ground dead. After the arrest and subsequent sensational trial the rum runners are hanged the following year. The focus in this story is on the victim and his family, not on the criminals and the crime. Too often victims are forgotton in the media frenzy after crimes are committed. Readers will be surprised to learn Steve Lawson is more than a historical footnote, but a major player in the history of the West.

During an era when many women concentrated on hearth and home, thousands of women quietly and without pay served in law enforcement. They organized, administered, presented reports to county commissioners, prepared for inspections, comforted victims, disciplined unruly inmates, fought with escapees, rode shotgun with their husbands as backup, and raised children, tended gardens, and kept house. They risked their lives every day and some paid the ultimate price. This is their story. The office of county sheriff has existed in America since 1634. Between 1800 and 1960, families of the sheriff lived in or near the jail. All family members, young and old, worked alongside the lawman to fulfill the required duties, without additional pay. The mom and pop jail was truly a family business. After the middle of the 20th century, fewer families carried on this tradition as counties modernized and jails became professionalized.

Lawmen of the old west played a juggling act as far as the law was concerned. It was necessary for a successful lawman to be both tougher and smarter than the outlaw or the outlaw would win. He sometimes did. The Earp Brothers were no saints. Marshal Henry Plumber was hanged for crimes he committed while wearing a badge. Most of the sheriffs and marshals wearing badges also played at gambling, sometimes owning the gambling concessions in the town saloons. As one would suspect, it was gambling that caused much of the trouble in town. The lawmen found themselves both supporting gambling while controlling angry gamblers. Most lawmen were good with guns and practiced daily. Being a second late on a draw against a fast outlaw gunman could spell the difference in which man lived. Western author Alton Pryor has brought a host of western lawmen together in one book.

A lively reference covering a century’s worth of shooters, sheriffs, and more in the Lone Star State. The Lone Star State is known for producing both vicious outlaws and valorous lawmen. While Machine Gun Kelly terrorized urban civilians, lawmen such as Ranger John Barclay Armstrong tried to keep things under control. This is the story of Texas’s most famous criminals, intrepid lawmen—and in the case of James Edwin Reed, both—as well as such figures as the legendary Judge Roy Bean. This reference brings to life a time before the West was tamed, and also includes a chronology of well-known crimes and a locale list of notorious events.

Seeks to discover why so many "good" people engage in activities that many, including themselves, consider "bad", finding a coalition of economic and social interest in which the singleminded quest for profit is allied to the values of the Victorian saloon underworld and bohemian rebelliousness.

The story of Eliot Ness, the legendary lawman who led the Untouchables, took on Al Capone, and saved a city’s soul As leader of an unprecedented crime-busting squad, twenty-eight-year-old Eliot Ness won fame for taking on notorious mobster Al Capone. But the Untouchables’ daring raids were only the beginning of Ness’s unlikely story. This new biography grapples with the charismatic lawman’s complicated, largely forgotten legacy. Perry chronicles Ness’s days in Chicago as well as his spectacular second act in Cleveland, where he achieved his greatest success: purging the profoundly corrupt city and forging new practices that changed police work across the country. He also faced one of his greatest challenges: a mysterious serial killer known as the Torso Murderer. Capturing the first complete portrait of the real Eliot Ness, Perry brings to life an unorthodox man who believed in the integrity of law and the power of American justice.