Joseph Wambaugh (1937–2025)

Riveting. Even though it was written in 1973, it remains relevant to issues facing us today, including PTSD, the legal system and capital punishment.

This is the true story of two robbers, Gregory Powell and Jimmy Smith, who kidnap policemen Karl Hettinger and Ian Campbell and subsequently kill Officer Campbell. Officer Hettinger goes through a harrowing escape. The killers are quickly arrested and the book details their journey through the court system. It also deals with the lasting impact show more of that terrible night on Karl Hettinger.

What struck me most powerfully was the total lack of support Officer Hettinger received from the police force. He got no counselling and was even openly blamed for the death of his partner. We watch him go through what we now know as PTSD with no support and with devastating consequences for his mental health.

Contrast that with the way Messrs Powell and Smith were given multiple opportunities to assert their innocence and/or reduce their initial sentences of death. While they were arrested pre-Miranda, the new standard was applied to their cases on appeal. The death penalty was abolished in California while Mr. Powell was on death row, so he avoided that verdict. While they were not coddled by the system. it nonetheless paid much more attention to their rights than to the needs of Karl Hettinger.

Joseph Wambaugh was a cop before he was an author and it shows in his treatment of this story, and in the way he helped develop the then-new genre of true crime. Still a worthwhile read after all this time.

P.S. Don't skip the introduction by James Ellroy. Probably the best introduction to a book I've even read. show less

Written in the 70s by an ex-cop, this is a darkly funny and bitter book, with a sharp edge of reality. 'Choir practice is where your average cop meets up to let off steam through drink, drugs and group sex. It's a secret and by invite only so when something bad happens, all hell breaks loose.

There are two great things about this: firstly the mix of tone from intensely funny to sad and disturbing and secondly the odd story structure. I was doubtful at first as it indicated a short story show more approach as each pair of partnered cops get their own chapter interspersed with glimpses of choir practice. But to my surprise the author makes it work very well, gently building layers upon layer of character and plot until the we catch up with current events. So as understanding grows so does the plot and you are slowly reeled in and hooked, especially towards the end as we begin to understand what happened and what the outcome will be.

All of the cops are flawed, some are deeply unpleasant sadists but at heart sympathy lies with them, highlighting that the number one cop killer is suicide. All the authors disgust for the upper echelons of the police force and it's here that the book really shines. Cops on the beat are ignored and blamed with equal measure and that makes a dark reality invade the book and gives even more of an edge.

A must for any lover of crime novels or black humour. This is a great big noisy book, that gets in your face and won't let go. Highly recommended. show less

I read this book when I was in high school and I remember liking it very much. Unfortunately, my well-liked books from the long-ago time are falling victim to rereads. I should stop reading books that my younger self liked. So far, the only book that stood the test of time is Dune.

Most of this book is about the changing legal ideals of the late 1960s and early 1970s. I suppose I was excited about it then. Now, much later in life, I've seen a few cycles of the extreme swings of left to right show more and back again. It's clear that ever-changing legal fads hurt the people it is supposed to protect, both criminal and victim. Now it leaves me disgusted. Wambaugh looks at the case through 1950s/60s colored glasses. I couldn't.

To his favor, Wanbaugh presented the idea that there are criminals among victims, and victims among criminals, and studied both.

I'd put The Onion Field at 3.5, leaning into the 4 range, because, technically the book is fine. It's well written as true crime, but the court shenanigans were belabored and eventually became repetitive. I was glad to be done with it. show less

An author friend of mine who knows what I’ve been working on suggested that I should read Joseph Wambaugh’s [The Onion Field]. He said that few writers these days are focusing on the real lives of policemen, detectives. Sure, procedurals and thrillers strain the shelves at your local bookstores, but few, if any, give you a look at a cop as he truly is – his life beyond the work, the problems and joys of real life. Most crime books focus on how the work invades and crowds life, until show more there really isn’t any life at all, and what existed before the work is tossed a quick nostalgic line or two. But Wambaugh, he said, went deeply into the psyche of the two policemen at [The Onion Field]’s center, letting them exhibit their full personalities and struggles so that the consequences of what happened to them is that much more troubling.

Ian Campbell and Karl Hettinger, former Marines, made a car stop in an unmarked squad car while on patrol in Los Angeles in 1963. During the stop, the two crooks disarmed them and kidnapped them, taking them to a remote agricultural area near Bakersfield. There, Campbell was shot and killed. Hettinger escaped serious physical injury, but was never the same. Their actions that night, especially Hettinger’s as the survivor, were heavily scrutinized. A policy was enacted by the Los Angeles Police Department stating that officers were never to surrender their firearms, under any circumstances; that if they were confronted with such a situation, they were to fight at all costs. The killers were convicted after several trials that took up many years, but at a mammoth cost in resources and personal sacrifice.

One terribly interesting section features a “young red-faced vice officer at Wilshire station [who] had been a policeman less than three years.” Through his eyes, we see the debate about whether Hettinger sealed his partner’s fate or did the best thing by surrendering his firearm. The young officer lays out several other instances where cops were disarmed and kidnapped but survived. He chastises the departmental policy enacted after Campbell’s murder, laying it at the feet of administrators who don’t understand the street and the street cop’s mentality. He speaks up at roll-call in defense of Hettinger, criticizing the policy. I don’t know for certain, but I think this young cop is Wambaugh in anonymity, sending the message he wants the book to carry. Indeed, I’m told that this book helped to end Wambaugh’s law enforcement career with LAPD.

The thread running through the entire book is the fallout in Hettinger’s life over the event. At a time before post-traumatic stress was recognized, and in a field where any weakness signals the sharks, Hettinger is a sad case. He devolves into alcoholism and shoplifting, eschewing anyone who would try to talk to him about what he felt, what he was experiencing. If you didn’t have Wambaugh’s name on the front cover, you might be drawn to a conclusion that Hettinger himself wrote the book, given how deeply Hettinger’s inner life is on display. It’s the reason this book is so provocative. To be able to see a cop as something less than a superhero, something more than a broken-down bulldog, is a revelation.

Bottom Line: Brilliant, insightful glimpse into the mind of policemen – policemen as real people, with real lives, as we rarely think of them.

4 ½ bones!!!!! show less