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Bent Coppers: The Story of The Man Who Arrested John Lennon, George Harrison and Brian Jones
London, England, 1967. An explosion of recreational drugs has resulted in the emergence of an anti-establiment hippy culture, worsening crime rates and an increasingly paranoid tabloid press. A young and ambitious police officer joins the Metropolitan Police Drug Squad determined to right these emerging cultural wrongs. His method? To tackle head on the most high-profile examples of wanton drug abuse. His targets? The celebrities, musicians and dilettantes all exploiting Britain's burgeoning drugs trade, glamourising illegal activity and promoting their untouchable wealth and fame to an impressionable generation. Bent Coppers is the electrifying true story of Norman Pilcher, the most infamous police officer in British law enforcement history. Truth and justice were the tenets of Pilcher's war against crime in the capital, but they soon collapsed in a landslide of scandal, perjury and blazing newspaper headlines. The man who arrested The Beatles and The Rolling Stones would pay the ultimate price for his service. Finally he sets the record straight.
262 pages, Kindle Edition
Published September 29, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
October 6, 2020
There is nothing I love more than a good police drama but this is the story of the man who arrested some HUGE names which makes it even more special.
Complete with real police reports and Pilcher’s witty humour, Bent Coppers is the perfect read for those who want to experience what it was like being a policeman in the 1960s, when the force was corrupt and had its fair share of cover-ups.
Complete with real police reports and Pilcher’s witty humour, Bent Coppers is the perfect read for those who want to experience what it was like being a policeman in the 1960s, when the force was corrupt and had its fair share of cover-ups.
February 8, 2026
Another day, another disappointing copper memoir. I had relatively high hopes for this one, given the prominence and notoriety of the individual concerned. Unfortunately, this was badly written to the point of incoherence; my understanding was that it was at least ghost written, but if so, the “real” writer did the bare minimum. It reads like it was transcribed verbatim from tapes; at best, you could say that someone bothered to put related bits together. But then you end up with chapters that seem to repeat the same information in a different form of words.
The other disappointment is that the promise of the shout line and front page is that we’re going to get a first-hand account of the notorious rock star raids of the second half of the 1960s; unfortunately, we do not. Details given are sketchy. Pilcher’s comments on Lennon and Harrison are anodyne and you get no real detail on the intelligence and background to these raids, other than a reference to Home Office pressure. Apparently, the government thought that arresting high profile individuals for drugs would discourage the youth from taking them. Pilcher claims he didn’t want to follow these orders, but wanted to tackle the supply chain instead. I believe him, but what we end up with isn’t very interesting.
Pilcher’s Wikipedia entry incorrectly states that he was involved in the notorious Redlands raid in 1967. There’s also a lot of discourse (including in this book) about the idea that he was the “semolina pilchard” referred to in “I Am the Walrus”. It doesn’t add up for me. Lennon wasn’t arrested until quite late in 1968, almost a full year after “Walrus”, and Harrison wasn’t arrested until 1969. It’s possible that Lennon was aware of Pilcher via the publicity of other arrests (Dusty Springfield? Brian Jones?) but the evidence is flimsy. Coincidence, I say.
Pilcher has long been vilified by music fans as the publicity hound corrupt cop who planted drugs on rock stars and pre-warned the press when raids were about to take place. He denies all this. His arguments are quite convincing. On the one hand, he says, why would they bother going to the trouble of planting drugs when they had more work than they could cope with? And on the other, he was convinced that someone in his unit was informing the press, but it wasn’t him.
Pilcher was eventually jailed for perjury in the 70s, following a drug trafficking case unrelated to Beatles or Stones. His main aim here is to set the record straight. He was jailed on the technicality that he falsified case diaries—which he freely admits was common practice. He gave evidence at the trial in question from his personal notebook, which he says was accurate. In terms of falsifying entries in case diaries, he asserts that this was sanctioned by his superiors—especially given their suspicions that there was someone in the squad who had underworld connections and was leaking information.
The great irony of his prosecution, according to him, is that the authorities were really after his superior officer, who was swimming in corruption and bribery, pocketing huge sums of money, and generaly getting away with it. In the event, Pilcher and other members of his close team were jailed for perjury while this corrupt superior got off scot-free. So it goes.
The final disappointment is that the title Bent Coppers suggests that Pilcher is planning to lift the lid on police corruption in the Met in the 1960s and 1970s. He certainly starts strong, by telling the story of how he was gifted a wad of cash on one of his first solo patrols as a beat constable. He gave the money to his superiors, who were in the middle of counting out piles of the stuff and dividing it among themselves. Elsewhere, he discusses individuals who were on the take, accepting $65k from American agents, for example; or recirculating siezed drugs. But he doesn’t set out to detail these corrupt practices or spin them into a coherent narrative. He falls back on blaming the Freemasons, repetitively, but without offering much in the way of evidence.
So there’s not much in the way of colour here on policing London in the 60s, and the rock star walk-ons are vague and detached. There’s a whole middle section of poorly reproduced documents, but these were too hard to read, really.
Perhaps the strangest thing about this whole story is that nobody seemed to know that he had died till about two years after the event.
The other disappointment is that the promise of the shout line and front page is that we’re going to get a first-hand account of the notorious rock star raids of the second half of the 1960s; unfortunately, we do not. Details given are sketchy. Pilcher’s comments on Lennon and Harrison are anodyne and you get no real detail on the intelligence and background to these raids, other than a reference to Home Office pressure. Apparently, the government thought that arresting high profile individuals for drugs would discourage the youth from taking them. Pilcher claims he didn’t want to follow these orders, but wanted to tackle the supply chain instead. I believe him, but what we end up with isn’t very interesting.
Pilcher’s Wikipedia entry incorrectly states that he was involved in the notorious Redlands raid in 1967. There’s also a lot of discourse (including in this book) about the idea that he was the “semolina pilchard” referred to in “I Am the Walrus”. It doesn’t add up for me. Lennon wasn’t arrested until quite late in 1968, almost a full year after “Walrus”, and Harrison wasn’t arrested until 1969. It’s possible that Lennon was aware of Pilcher via the publicity of other arrests (Dusty Springfield? Brian Jones?) but the evidence is flimsy. Coincidence, I say.
Pilcher has long been vilified by music fans as the publicity hound corrupt cop who planted drugs on rock stars and pre-warned the press when raids were about to take place. He denies all this. His arguments are quite convincing. On the one hand, he says, why would they bother going to the trouble of planting drugs when they had more work than they could cope with? And on the other, he was convinced that someone in his unit was informing the press, but it wasn’t him.
Pilcher was eventually jailed for perjury in the 70s, following a drug trafficking case unrelated to Beatles or Stones. His main aim here is to set the record straight. He was jailed on the technicality that he falsified case diaries—which he freely admits was common practice. He gave evidence at the trial in question from his personal notebook, which he says was accurate. In terms of falsifying entries in case diaries, he asserts that this was sanctioned by his superiors—especially given their suspicions that there was someone in the squad who had underworld connections and was leaking information.
The great irony of his prosecution, according to him, is that the authorities were really after his superior officer, who was swimming in corruption and bribery, pocketing huge sums of money, and generaly getting away with it. In the event, Pilcher and other members of his close team were jailed for perjury while this corrupt superior got off scot-free. So it goes.
The final disappointment is that the title Bent Coppers suggests that Pilcher is planning to lift the lid on police corruption in the Met in the 1960s and 1970s. He certainly starts strong, by telling the story of how he was gifted a wad of cash on one of his first solo patrols as a beat constable. He gave the money to his superiors, who were in the middle of counting out piles of the stuff and dividing it among themselves. Elsewhere, he discusses individuals who were on the take, accepting $65k from American agents, for example; or recirculating siezed drugs. But he doesn’t set out to detail these corrupt practices or spin them into a coherent narrative. He falls back on blaming the Freemasons, repetitively, but without offering much in the way of evidence.
So there’s not much in the way of colour here on policing London in the 60s, and the rock star walk-ons are vague and detached. There’s a whole middle section of poorly reproduced documents, but these were too hard to read, really.
Perhaps the strangest thing about this whole story is that nobody seemed to know that he had died till about two years after the event.
August 8, 2025
Didn't know anything about this so interesting but hard to follow in parts.
December 4, 2021
Another book for the Twelve Days of Clink Street Publishing.
I'm a great fan of Line of Duty with its corrupt coppers, so to read the true story of Norman Pilcher, who was incarcerated for doing his job was so compelling & interesting.
Very well written, brutally honest & full of drama. Many famous names have been arrested by Norman, including Rolling Stone Brian Jones, John Lennon & George Harrison of The Beatles.
Some great photos were included throughout the book & images of court docs.
Norman was dealt an absolute injustice during his time as a law abiding officer & for him to be arrested as he touched down on Australian soil to start his new life, was an absolute miscarriage of justice.
Many thanks to Kaleidoscopic Tours for my tour spot & the publishers for my gifted copy.
𝗜 𝗴𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝗮 4 ⭐ 𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴
I'm a great fan of Line of Duty with its corrupt coppers, so to read the true story of Norman Pilcher, who was incarcerated for doing his job was so compelling & interesting.
Very well written, brutally honest & full of drama. Many famous names have been arrested by Norman, including Rolling Stone Brian Jones, John Lennon & George Harrison of The Beatles.
Some great photos were included throughout the book & images of court docs.
Norman was dealt an absolute injustice during his time as a law abiding officer & for him to be arrested as he touched down on Australian soil to start his new life, was an absolute miscarriage of justice.
Many thanks to Kaleidoscopic Tours for my tour spot & the publishers for my gifted copy.
𝗜 𝗴𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝗮 4 ⭐ 𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews