The Savage City: Race, Murder, and a Generation on the Edge
“T.J. English has the mastered the hybrid narrative art form of social history and underworld thriller. The Savage City is a truly gripping read filled with unexpected twists and turns.”
—Douglas Brinkley, author of The Great Deluge
In The Savage City, T.J. English, author of the New York Times bestselling blockbuster Havana Nocturne, takes readers back to a frightening place in a dark time of violence and urban chaos: New York City in the 1960s and early ’70s. As he did in his acclaimed true crime masterwork, The Westies, English focuses on the rot on the Big Apple in this stunning tale of race, murder, and a generation on the edge—as he interweaves the real-life sagas of a corrupt cop, a militant Black Panther, and an innocent young African American man framed by the NYPD for a series of crimes, including a brutal and sensational double murder.
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Community Reviews
This book focuses on NYC in the '60s and '70s, when racial tensions were at an all-time high and the NYPD was filled with crooked cops.
The author mainly follows the lives of three people:
1) George Whitmore, a young black man from Wildwood, NJ, described as a "simpleton," who was easily led by the NYPD through a false confession to two rapes in Brooklyn and a sensational double homicide known as "The Career Girl Murders" in NYC, and how it took years to unravel the mess and finally get him out of prison and cleared of any wrongdoing in any of these crimes. (Interesting anecdote: His story was supposed to be made into a feature film but instead was chiseled down to a TV movie, where all names were changed, and it instead focused on a cop who "knew from the beginning" that this man was innocent - ended up being the pilot for the Kojak TV series.)
2) Bill Phillips, one of the most corrupt NYPD cops during that time frame, who had no shame and no apologies for his actions, until Serpico and the Knapp Commission brought him down and he turned into a "snitch" to try to save himself, only to be accused later of another double homicide.
3) Dhoruba bin Wahad, a small-time criminal who became a big player in the Black Panther movement and later a founding member of the Black Liberation Army. He believed MLK was an ineffective leader, too passive for the changes and the revolution that needed to occur.
So hard to imagine what a war zone the city was in those days. English does a great job of fleshing out the history and weaving these stories together, mostly to get an understanding of how the unfortunate George Whitmore was railroaded into a murder rap.
For my courthouse friends, our own John F. Keenan makes an appearance in the book too, as a top assistant DA during the time of the Black Panther trials.
The author mainly follows the lives of three people:
1) George Whitmore, a young black man from Wildwood, NJ, described as a "simpleton," who was easily led by the NYPD through a false confession to two rapes in Brooklyn and a sensational double homicide known as "The Career Girl Murders" in NYC, and how it took years to unravel the mess and finally get him out of prison and cleared of any wrongdoing in any of these crimes. (Interesting anecdote: His story was supposed to be made into a feature film but instead was chiseled down to a TV movie, where all names were changed, and it instead focused on a cop who "knew from the beginning" that this man was innocent - ended up being the pilot for the Kojak TV series.)
2) Bill Phillips, one of the most corrupt NYPD cops during that time frame, who had no shame and no apologies for his actions, until Serpico and the Knapp Commission brought him down and he turned into a "snitch" to try to save himself, only to be accused later of another double homicide.
3) Dhoruba bin Wahad, a small-time criminal who became a big player in the Black Panther movement and later a founding member of the Black Liberation Army. He believed MLK was an ineffective leader, too passive for the changes and the revolution that needed to occur.
So hard to imagine what a war zone the city was in those days. English does a great job of fleshing out the history and weaving these stories together, mostly to get an understanding of how the unfortunate George Whitmore was railroaded into a murder rap.
For my courthouse friends, our own John F. Keenan makes an appearance in the book too, as a top assistant DA during the time of the Black Panther trials.
