Integrity Based Policing: Policing the Streets of Las Vegas

by Dan Barry

Experience firsthand policing in America’s Playground. This book contains stories that are based on my thirty-year career with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. Despite all my “peaks and valleys,” I never lost my love of policing, or passion for the people I served. While many of my experiences are amusing, they also are enlightening for people considering a career in law enforcement. My most important lesson learned is that decisions must be based on ethical soundness, as opposed to other motivations. The challenges facing American police officers have never been greater. Besides the dangers from criminals, they also need to navigate through administrations that are often more concerned about tomorrow’s headline, than providing true leadership. As opposed to considering ethical soundness, agencies are often most concerned with only the politically popular path. My prayer is for police agencies to work in partnership with the citizens they serve in making our neighborhoods a safer place. For this to be achieved “Integrity-Based Policing” must become the new standard for all agencies to adopt.

277 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 20, 2019

About the author

Dan Barry is a longtime columnist and reporter for The New York Times and the author of four books, including the forthcoming “The Boys in the Bunkhouse: Servitude and Salvation in the Heartland.” Set to be released in May 2016, the book tells the story of dozens of men with intellectual disability who spent decades working at an Iowa turkey-processing plant, living in an old schoolhouse, and enduring exploitation and abuse – before finding justice and achieving freedom.
As the “This Land” columnist for the Times, Barry traveled to all 50 states, where he met the coroner from “The Wizard of Oz,” learned the bump-and-grind from a mostly retired burlesque queen, and was hit in the chest by an Asian carp leaping out of the Illinois River. He has since recovered -- though the condition of the carp remains unknown.
He has reported extensively on many topics, including the World Trade Center disaster and its aftermath and the damage to the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. He has also been the City Hall bureau chief, the Long Island bureau chief, a sportswriter, a general assignment reporter, and, for three years, the “About New York” columnist – all for the Times.
Barry previously worked for the Journal Inquirer in Manchester, Conn., and for The Providence Journal, where he and two other reporters won a George Polk Award for an investigation into the causes of a state banking crisis. In 1994, he and the other members of the Journal’s investigative team won a Pulitzer Prize for a series of articles about Rhode Island’s court system; the series led to various reforms and the criminal indictment of the chief justice of the state’s Supreme Court.
Barry has also written “Pull Me Up: A Memoir”; “City Lights: Stories About New York,” a collection of his “About New York” columns; and “Bottom of the 33rd: Hope, Redemption, and Baseball’s Longest Game,” which received the 2012 PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing.