Film-maker, writer and criminologist Roger Graef has perhaps done more than anybody else to open up the police as an institution to the public and reveal the methods and personalities of these ordinary people doing an extraordinary job. He's still possibly best known for his "fly-on-the-wall" documentary about Thames Valley Police in the late-70s but this book is equally revealing. Released in 1989, it came a few years after the Broadwater Farm riots and the miners' strike.
Graef and his colleague interviewed 500 officers from 12 forces and let them talk. With a minimum of scene-setting, we get the direct voices of officers from all levels talking about public order, race, community policing, justice, corruption and the effect of the job on their private lives. Graef himself called it "an emotional mosaic". Anonymity resulted in an honesty from his interviewees that it's hard to imagine in these post-Macpherson days, when you feel officers would be much more defensive.
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