The Badge: True and Terrifying Crime Stories That Could Not Be Presented on TV, from the Creator and Star of Dragnet [Paperback]

Jack Webb (Author), James Ellroy (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 10, 2005

Before Charlie's Angels, Miami Vice, or NYPD Blue, there was Dragnet. From 1951 to 1959, Jack Webb starred as Sergeant Joe Friday in the most successful police drama in television history. Webb ("Just the facts, ma'am") was also the creator of Dragnet, and what made the show so revolutionary was its documentary-style format and the fact that each episode was "ripped" from the files of the LAPD. But 1950s television censors deemed many of the stories in the LAPD's files too violent or sensational for the airwaves. The Badge is Webb's collection of stories that could not be presented on TV: untold, behind-the-scenes accounts of the Black Dahlia murder, the Brenda Allen confessions, Stephen Nash's "thrill murders," and Donald Bashor's "sleeping lady murders," to name just a few. Case by case, The Badge takes readers on a spine chilling police tour through the dark, shadowy world of Los Angeles crime. It is a journey that, even four decades after it originally appeared in print, no reader is likely to forget.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"To this day, the cases in there continue to drive me. Here it is, forty-one years later, I remain driven, morally and psychically, by what I got out of that book. It's astonishing." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Da Capo Press (April 10, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1560256885
• ISBN-13: 978-1560256885
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #658,312 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great True Stories of Crime in Los Angeles and the LAPD, October 21, 2005

By 

Beth Fox "Beth A. Fox" (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Badge: True and Terrifying Crime Stories That Could Not Be Presented on TV, from the Creator and Star of Dragnet (Paperback)

On radio, in the 1950s television version of Dragnet, and in its 1960s resurrection, Jack Webb was Sergeant Joe Friday, the straight-shooting, no-nonsense exemplar of the LAPD. In this non-fiction book, Webb tells the real stories of crimes that were too violent to be broadcast on "Dragnet." Among them are the famous murder of the "Black Dahlia," a woman who was tortured for days before her killer slit her throat, drained her body of blood, bisected it and dumped her in an empty lot. Another story that made my blood boil was the murder of a 10-year old orphaned boy, whose own mother had just died days before. His father lost a wife and, senselessly, a son within weeks to a murderer who killed for the thrill of it.

Each chapter of the book is labeled with an LAPD rank, from Policeman, to Sergeant, to Lieutenant, all the way to Commissioner(s). The stories in the first few chapters are the most absorbing, as they demonstrate actual, hands-on police work. Yet, it was also interesting to read of problems which confronted, and still confront, Los Angeles and its police force at higher levels. The book particularly presents a good picture of Chief Parker, who is responsible for cleaning up the vice and corruption that marked the pre-1950 LAPD and setting rules that made officers proud to serve.

A warning to 21st century readers: This book was written in 1958 with the stereotypes -- and the language -- common at the time. Some sentences might make you gasp: i.e., in describing race relations in Los Angeles, Webb writes that "It is a dozen collisions, the Oriental, the Mexican, the Indian, the Southerner (both Negro and white), the Easterner and the Westerner; intra-racial as well as one skin pitted against another of a different color." There are a lot of sentences like that, particularly in the later chapters, where Webb was trying to argue that the LAPD of the time was cognizant of ethnic tensions and attempted to ameliorate them. (As an unabashed LAPD booster, Webb marshals evidence to make his case that the department was addressing racism.) And, from a 21st century viewpoint, the LAPD war against bingo parlors seems terribly penny-ante, although perhaps justified by the "broken windows" theory.

But the heart of this book is the stories of crimes great and small, and the police officers who solved them. A must for those interested in true crime stories, Los Angeles history, and the LAPD.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Badge, then and now., September 22, 2006

By 

Gary D. Ryno "Hornless One" (San Antonio, Texas) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Badge: True and Terrifying Crime Stories That Could Not Be Presented on TV, from the Creator and Star of Dragnet (Paperback)

I remember watching "Dragnet" and "Badge 714" when I was a kid. I came across the book "The Badge" during my tenth year in high school, which was in 1960. I read it several times and remember being amazed by the contrast in the way Jack Webb wrote and the way he protrayed the Sgt. Joe Friday character. For some strange reason, this book has always been in the back of my mind, and so when the recent release of "The Black Dahlia" came about in the movie circuit, I, just on a whim, went to Amazon.com to see if an old edition of "The Badge" was floating around somewhere. I remembered that Jack Webb had written about this case in His book. I could not believe that, not only was it available, but available for under five frogskins, and new too boot!!!

I am now in the process of reading this book again, and am again amazed at Jack Webb's ability to write. He was so far ahead of his time, in his ability to tell a story back then that even now, his writing is beyond the typical codswample that is available today. Jack Webb was always so robotic in the way He acted, moving about like he had a two-by-four piece of lumber tied to his spine. His writing ability was another story.

I am once again amazed by this man's ability to write a story. Anyone who buys this book and reads it will NOT be disappointed. In fact, I would suggest that quite the opposite will be true.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars GOOD READ FOR CRIME BUFFS, February 8, 2006

By 

Christopher M. Mireles (LOS ANGELES, CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Badge: True and Terrifying Crime Stories That Could Not Be Presented on TV, from the Creator and Star of Dragnet (Paperback)

THE BOOK GIVES A GOOD INSIGHT TO THE HISTORY OF THE LAPD.....IT LETS YOU INTO CRIMES THAT HAVE HAUNTED THE AREA FOR YEARS AND GIVES YOU AN APPRECIATION TO THOSE WHO HAVE TO WEAR THE ACTUAL BADGE.