WitSec: Inside the Federal Witness Protection Program by Pete Earley and Gerald Shur

I've always been interested in crime.  When I was younger, I actually wanted to study psychology and learn more about criminal profiling.  Nature v Nurture and the inner workings of a criminal always fascinated me, however, the incredibly low hiring rate didn't work for my need to have a job!  Even though I didn't choose it as a career path, I often read books regarding crime.

I've been living in Kansas City for about 2.5 years now, and it wasn't until this year that I really started to understand how involved KC was in the gang scene.  Organized crime, crooked politics, and gangs ran rampant through KC due to it's prime geographical placement.  I started reading more about organized crime, and you can't read about organized crime without learning about witness protection.

Enter; my desire to read this book.  It's essentially a history of the entire program, from inception through today.  Wit Sec was originally a political issue that the Kennedy brothers started.  When R. Kennedy was US Attorney General, he started the program that would develop into Wit Sec.  He wanted to wage a war on organized crime.  At the time, "Omerta" ran deep in the mafia.  No one would speak out for fear of being killed or putting their family at risk.  Gerald Shur was chosen as one of the attorneys on this task force challenged with breaking up organized crime.  They soon realized if they could convince one member to turn, the enterprise was so inner connected they could bring down the top members of the mafia.  They started to promise witnesses protection, which led to new identities, which led to the witness protection program.

There is so much in this book!  You can see how the Wit Sec program develops from these Cowboy type Federal Marshals that have to write their own rules in the field, to the highly structured program it is today.  There are also interesting stories about crime bosses, relocated witnesses, and even a section written by a relocated witness about her experience.  It's incredibly hard to sum up the story in a paragraph because every election, federal appointment, and large arrest drastically changed the program.

Anyway, if you are a crime nerd like me, you will definitely enjoy this book!

<3, jacq