Chapter One Tuesday January 19 Pulling one hand from the warmth of a pocket Jay Landsman squats down to grab the dead man's chin pushing the head to one side until the wound becomes visible as a small ovate hole oozing red and white. "Here's your problem" he said. "He's got a slow leak." "A leak?" says Pellegrini picking up on it. "A slow one." "You can fix those." "Sure you can" Landsman agrees. "They got these home repair kits now . . ." "Like with tires." "Just like with tires" Landsman says. "Comes with a patch and everything else you need. Now a bigger wound like from a thirty-eight you're gonna have to get a new head. This one you could fix." Landsman looks up his face the very picture of earnest concern. Sweet Jesus thinks Tom Pellegrini nothing like working murders with a mental case. One in the morning heart of the ghetto half a dozen uniforms watching their breath freeze over another dead manwhat better time and place for some vintage Landsman delivered in perfect deadpan until even the shift commander is laughing hard in the blue strobe of the emergency lights. Not that a Western District midnight shift is the world's toughest audience; you don't ride a radio car for any length of time in Sector 1 or 2 without cultivating a diseased sense of humor. "Anyone know this guy?" asks Landsman. "Anyone get to talk to him?" "Fuck no" says a uniform. "He was ten-seven when we got here." Ten-seven. The police communication code for "out of service" artlessly applied to a human life. Beautiful. Pellegrini smiles content in the knowledge that nothing in this world can come between a cop and his attitude. "Anyone go through his pockets?" asks Landsman. "Not yet." "Where the fuck are his pockets?" "He's wearing pants underneath the sweatsuit." Pellegrini watches Landsman straddle the body one foot on either side of the dead man's waist and begin tugging violently at the sweatpants. The awkward effort jerks the body a few inches across the sidewalk leaving a thin film of matted blood and brain matter where the head wound scrapes the pavement. Landsman forces a meaty hand inside a front pocket. "Watch for needles" says a uniform. "Hey" says Landsman. "Anyone in this crowd gets AIDS no one's gonna believe it came from a fucking needle." The sergeant pulls his hand from the dead man's right front pocket causing perhaps a dollar in change to fall to the sidewalk. "No wallet in front. I'm gonna wait and let the ME roll him. Somebody's called the ME right?" "Should be on the way" says a second uniform taking notes for the top sheet of an incident report. "How many times is he hit?" Landsman points to the head wound then lifts a shoulder blade to reveal a ragged hole in the upper back of the dead man's leather jacket. "Once in the head once in the back." Landsman pauses and Pellegrini watches him go deadpan once again. "It could be more." The uniform puts pen to paper.

"Simon does an extraordinary job of getting under the skin and into the minds of the police officers."The New York Times Book Review "We seem to have an insatiable appetite for police stories . . . David Simon's entry is far and away the best the most readable reliable and relentless of them all." The Washington Post Book World

From the creator of HBO'sThe Wire the classic book about homicide investigation that became the basis for the hit television show The scene is Baltimore. Twice every three days another citizen is shot stabbed or bludgeoned to death. At the center of this hurricane of crime is the city's homicide unit a small brotherhood of hard men who fight for whatever justice is possible in a deadly world. David Simon was the first reporter ever to gain unlimited access to a homicide unit and this electrifying book tells the true story of a year on the violent streets of an American city. The narrative follows Donald Worden a veteran investigator; Harry Edgerton a black detective in a mostly white unit; and Tom Pellegrini an earnest rookie who takes on the year's most difficult case the brutal rape and murder of an eleven-year-old girl. Originally published fifteen years agoHomicidebecame the basis for the acclaimed television show of the same name. This new editionwhich includes a new introduction an afterword and photographsrevives this classic riveting tale about the men who work on the dark side of the American experience.