Tainted Evidence [Mass Market Paperback]

Robert Daley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 1994

Caught in the middle of an outbreak of racial violence, New York City Assistant DA Karen Henning finds her passions threaten her loyalties when she falls in love with her key witness. Reprint. K.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

An engrossing story of passion and power, Tainted Evidence is the basis for the movie Night Falls on Manhattan, directed by Sidney Lumet. When a drug-dealing murder suspect guns down five police officers during a botched raid in Harlem, New York City's percolating racial tensions explode. Assistant District Attorney Karen Henning becomes involved with the case and ends up challenging her principles and loyalties when she falls in love with her star witness. The case threatens to destroy her carefully built life and the justice system she has worked so long to protect. Robert Daley spins a convincing tale of police, politics, and juris prudence that grabs the reader's attention and doesn't let it go until long after the book is closed.

From Publishers Weekly

Despite sharply written scenes and dialogue, this combination of a police procedural and a courtroom drama about a murder suspect who shoots five cops lacks depth and closure.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 448 pages
• Publisher: Vision; 1st PB ed. edition (March 1, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446600830
• ISBN-13: 978-0446600835
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #692,182 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Must read, January 4, 2011

By 

Ann Goodson - See all my reviews

This review is from: Tainted Evidence (Mass Market Paperback)

Law enforcement used to be an all male society. I guess it still is. Women are considered incompetent until proven otherwise and are thwarted by their colleagues whenever possible. This is a NY cop story. A black drug dealer is holed up in a condemned tenement. Detectives set up a raid, it is botched, 5 cops are shot.For political reasons the case is given to a female DA who is also a wife and mother. She faces intense pressure from the police brass and her colleagues. The case takes strange turns, the suspense goes up and up as does the pressure on the DA. Her chief witness, one of the detectives, has eyes for her. I found this an original and fascinating story and hard to put down.Tainted Evidence

2.0 out of 5 stars Tainted Story, July 13, 2008

By 

Prolific Reader (Rochester, WA USA) - See all my reviews

This is my first book by Robert Daley and am glad it was given to me and I didn't spend money on it. This is basically a story about the problems in Harlem between blacks and the white cops who work in that neighborhood. Mr. Daley had a good story but he starts to tell you what happened and ends up telling pages of information about various NY neighborhoods, where they are located, what type of people live there, if houses are kept up, etc., jumps around until the crime actually gets to the shooting and trial, you don't know what is going on.
He tells bits and pieces, tells a bit about various people, never finishes anything so you get lost as to where this book is going.

He has the two main cop characters start to tell stories about other cases at times but never finishes any of them. Mostly he has Muldoon spouting filthy words and putting down any and everyone he comes in contact with, drinking constantly even on the job. It makes it hard to sympathize with the guy when he loses his job basically because he is a slob who thinks he can do what he wants, no one really likes him and the mayor and police commissioner need a scape goat.

Muldoon's partner Barone would be more likeable as he seems to be a good cop and tries to keep Muldoon in control but he also is a womanizer and it is hard to feel anything but disgust for him and pity for his family whom he considers last in his daily life. He is too busy looking for his next sexual conquest and making sure he is dressed to the nines. He seems to think little of his wife and uses her mostly it seems as a housekeeper, babysitter and little else.

Then there is Karen, the leading lady and acting DA. She is so busy preening and congratulating herself on just about every decision she makes, that you want to throw up especially after she is so happy with herself because she slept with "old quick zipper" the first time with no regard for her husband or kids. She is entitled because she has worked hard and besides her husband will never know. She became much more likeable after she loses the all important case and is taken down a notch or two.
All in all, this could have been a good book but too much jerking around with this story and truly gross people. No resolution to anything. The sleazy lawyer who defends the criminal is a liar who doesn't care about justice or the truth and the judge is gutless. The former assistant DA was a real jerk and liar who undermined his own office and staff. No wonder people hate lawyers when they read ridiculous stories like this where nothing is sacred, not the law, not faithfulness to family and spouses, not to your fellow workers, nothing. The best people in the story was Larry Coombs, Hank, Hilary and Jackie. Karen did not deserve any of them.