Customer Reviews

Witsec: Inside the Federal Witness Protection Program

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I found WITSEC to be fascinating from cover to cover. Gerald Shur was one of the original founders of the federal Witness Protection Program. For many years, he was the lynchpin in bringing increasing levels of organization and professionalism to a once informal "make it up as you go along" experimental program.

Now retired and finally free to give an insider's view of the program and its successes and failures, Gerald Shur offers a sometimes captivatingly honest and direct chronicle of the challenges and growing pains the program went through over the years. He is able to give an honest appraisal of the good decisions and successes the program has had, and even more admirable, he is able to state and own the program's shortcomings and outright failures. I admire the fact that Shur has been able to step aside from this work that he lived and breathed for so many years and offer a fairly objective story of the program.

At one point in the book, a relocated witnesses' wife tells her own personal story. It is a touching and sad story of a woman who had to abandon herself without notice and chronicles the 25 years after she was first relocated. I cannot imagine, even after having read this book, how difficult it must be to leave one's entire identity behind in order to "become someone completely new" -- birth history, family, origins, family support systems, and familiar surroundings -- all in order to help save a partner's life or one's own! While some have been extremely critical of the purpose of the witness protection program over the years, this is no glamorous escape for criminals who would be otherwise incarcerated for their entire lives. During my reading, it sometimes struck me that the cost of giving up one's entire "life" in order to be protected is as stiff a price to pay as going to prison.

The Witness Protection program has been responsible for assisting in effectively paralyzing "organized crime" as we once knew in the United States. For over the last thirty years, this program, along with enforcement of the RICO statute and aggressive prosecution have very clearly limited the extent to which organized groups can impose their criminal behavior on others.

Peter Earley and Gerald Shur do an excellent job of providing an engaging and thoroughly entertaining chronicle of the first three decades of the Witness Protection Program from its start through its later development. In addition to its history, and a number of tales of harsh human drama, this is by no means a ponderous read. At points, as a reader I was simply howling in laughter at some of the characters that the program was expected to "protect". Even some of the agents had some extremely funny "three stooges" moments, as unintentional blunders became narrow escapes from harm's way.

Highly recommended

James J. Maloney
Saint Paul, Minnesota USA

Gerry Shur's unique story telling ability is expertly enhanced by Pete Earley's easy flowing writing style.

This book, which reads like a novel, provides the reader with and in depth look into why and how this Program was developed. Facts are laced with the right amount of anecdotal information, affording a balanced, accurate and fair portrayal of a controversial Government Program.

At times the reader may wonder if the main character of the book is Shur or Howard Safir but you quickly learn that without the leadership and innovative thinking of Safir, Shur's brainchild may have dwindled on the vine.

Pete Earley's inclusion of a mobster's wife's perspective on the Program is brilliant. It comes at just the right time in the sequence of events to allow the reader to more clearly understand the impact that this extremely effective law enforcement tool can have on the lives of those on the peripheral.

Once you begin, you won't want to put this one down.

What an education you will recieve from reading this book. The majority of the public will never have any clue what goes on in the life of a "protected witness"or how the "system" works ... that's one of the things that drew me to the book. Is Shur slanting the story, aggrandizing his own reputation? Whatever.

*The other thing that drew me to read it ... when I was in college in Southern California many years ago - living off-campus in an apartment with two roomates (attending a small, private Christian 'Liberal Arts' College) ... our neighbor was a single mother who never seemed to go to work (???), and never left the apartment.
One day she mentioned to my roomate that she was in the "Witness Protection Program". The very next week, in the middle of the night, there were agents moving out all her stuff very quickly. She left a note under our door saying she was moving to Hawaii. The day after she was out without a trace ... some people showed up to her apartment to force their way in. They ended up crawling through my roomate's bedroom window by mistake, while he was taking a nap (the guy had a tire iron in his hand). *What was scary - was they guy was very soft-spoken, and politely apologized to my roomate for the "intrusion". They eventually forced their way in through the sliding glass door on the balcony of her apartment (the one guy actually climbed the side of the building). Of course the apartment was empty.
We had called the police ... and within MINUTES the entire complex was swarming with agents, helicopters, and police dogs. We really had no idea what was going on - or if she was telling the truth about any of her story. The book made it all come to life. My story was just like many of those in the book.

The book really summed it up: "You choose WITSEC ... when you have absolutely NO other alternative". What a tough way to live - not to mention the trade-off you make.

Highly recommended reading.

This fast-paced non-fiction book reads like a novel. It's a fascinating look into the development of the Witness Protection Program--a program which is part of everyday lexicon, but whose origins and real-life operations are not widely known. Post-September 11, this book offers a timely look at how the original program has been expanded to bring the terrorists of the 1993 World Trade Center attack to justice, and has been used against the Colombian cartels, serving as a model to other countries. Shur, the self-effacing WITSEC founder, bluntly describes the problems with the program, past and present, and candidly talks about its failures as well as its successes. Interagency feuds and critics of the program, including Geraldo Rivera, are given ample space in this balanced account of the program that is widely credited with breaking the mob's code of silence. A first-person account of a relocated relative of a mob informant gives a chilling glimpse of life in the program. Informative AND entertaining, this book has Hollywood written all over it!

A very well done book about a very remarkable man. Gerald Shur is a patriot and a hero, his story is truly " a profile in courage ". Not only did he have to overcome the understandable reluctance of witnesses ( and what a group they were ) to testify but he also had to mollify Congress, deal with internecine bureaucratic struggles and contend with Geraldo--all the while fighting his own battle with M.S.Then to top it off head a dangerous but successful effort for justice in El Salvador and perform wonders in Thailand. In addition to all the strength of character required and displayed , Shur appears to have remained compassionate and self-effacing, a devoted husband and father.
While reading the book I kept thinking " What a movie " but now I think it would take at least a mini-series--too much good material here for one movie.
Gold medals to Shur and his wife , Miriam , and 5 stars to the book.

From the first pages, I found myself drawn into this fascinating history of the federal witness protection program. Some of the tales that WITSEC founder Gerald Shur can tell are amazing - as good as some of the better crime thrillers (proof yet again that fact is stranger than fiction). Some of the stories are terrible, too, but I really enjoyed the fact that the narration comes across in that "just the facts, ma'am" approach that doesn't attempt to skip or gloss over or put a spin on the mistakes and problems that came up. Overall, the book makes a powerful statement on why we have and why we need such a program.

Length:: 7:17 Mins

Not that I read much nowadays, but I'm almost finished with "Witsec Inside the federal witness protection program"


I am on chapter eighteen, so far the book has kept me coming back to finish it. After reading it you understand why there are people out there IN THE witness protection program that vocally say it's not a good thing. But WITSECs role in the history of the mafia, drug wars, and other major changes in our past is worth reading. I found the information about Pablo Escobar Gaviria and Adler "Barry" Seal fascinating. Barry was the youngest to captain a 747, an ex green beret. His demise is chronicled as he endend up working for the drug cartel, then an informant for the US government. He liked living dangerously, funny how that keeps some people going, all the excitement and risk.

I mostly ordered the book because of a murder I was researching, I wanted to see the possibility if this girls dad was put into the WITSEC program.

Forthright, well written and amply attributed are just the beginning of my praise for this important persective on a government program that changed America for the better.
Pete Earley is a gifted book journalist whose grasp of subjects amaze readers. By joining Gerald Shur, the father of the witness protection program, Earley was able to reach deep within the subject, the challenge and the bureaucracy that changed the face of organized crime in the United States. For critics of good government, this book should be mandatory. Witsec challenged a great public need and, as the book carefully details, got remarkable results under the toughest conditions.
Earley and Shur deserve top awards for their works.

I picked this out for my husband who never seems to be interested in book reading. I told him I had heard about it on talk radio and thought it was his type of reading. He sat down with it and in 2 days had read the entire book. Now it has been passed onto my 17 year old son. Its been a great buy!

For obvious reasons, the witness protection program has always been and probably always will be controversial. I believe the authors make a very good case for its merits, however. Thanks to this program, the law now has much more effective tools to protect ordinary people from the reckless, greed-crazed megalomaniacs who prey on them. It also gives those trapped in this soul-deadening lifestyle an opportunity to change their lives and make something worthwhile out of them. Apparently thousands of families' lives have been changed for the better as a result.

Politicians and television journalists like Geraldo Rivera thrive on stories like that of protected witness Marion Pruett who murdered his own wife and four other people after having entered WITSEC. Often, though, certain inconvenient details get swept aside. Such as the fact that Pruett would have been released from jail by the time he committed his crimes, anyway, whether he had joined the witness protection program or not. Because his sentence would have run out by then.

None of us like to see dangerous people on the loose, but the simple fact is that you can't keep everyone who has ever committed a crime in jail. Even if there weren't any ethical issues involved, there simply aren't enough resources. Thanks to our unrealistic drug laws, the United States is already the largest per-capita holder of prisoners in the entire world. What a sad commentary on the so-called land of the free and home of the brave.

I recommend this book for the fascinating glimpses it provides of politics both inside and outside the Justice Department. I was irritated to read about how J. Edgar Hoover's solution to organized crime was to simply claim it didn't exist despite the overwhelming evidence that it did. And I was enraged to read about Jeb Bush's lobbying to get a dangerous anti-Castro terrorist an early release from jail in order to drum up votes in Miami's Cuban community for his father's re-election. But I was also gratified to learn how hard work by Gerald Shur, Howard Safir and hundreds of others has paid off over the years despite attempts by corrupt government officials in America and elsewhere to both exploit and defeat it.

Also interesting was the story of how Shur and several deputy marshals traveled to Nicaragua during the Reagan years to protect the judge and jury of a trial against five soldiers accused of raping and murdering a carload of American nuns. The descriptions of the dangerous and seemingly hopeless conditions judges worked under in that country at that time made me thankful to be a citizen of a country which, while it is not perfect, at least offers its citizens a reasonably safe and reasonably fair environment in which to pursue meaningful lives.

The description of Colombia under the reign of terror of Pablo Escobar and other psychopaths was also frustrating to read. It's only fair to blame those Americans and others who supported Escobar through the purchase of illegal drugs for enabling him to become so powerful and despotic. Nevertheless, those who persist in believing that the best course of action to take against drugs is to simply ban them must surely see that they do just as much to enable the Escobars of yesterday and today than drug users. For, certainly, the price of these drugs is kept artificially very high because of the risks that must be taken to produce and distribute them.

Like all problems, the problem of illegal drugs is not a simple, black and white issue that can be solved by simply resorting to punitive measures. What is needed is innovative thinking such as what has gone toward the establishment and refinement of the witness protection program over the past four decades.