I Got a Monster

The Rise and Fall of America's Most Corrupt Police Squad

By: Baynard Woods, Brandon Soderberg

Narrated by: Ryan Vincent Anderson

Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins

Publisher's summary

The explosive true story of America's most corrupt police unit, the Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF), which terrorized the city of Baltimore for half a decade.

When Baltimore Police Sergeant Wayne Jenkins said he had a monster, he meant he had found a big-time drug dealer - one who he wanted to rob. This is the story of Jenkins and the Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF), a super group of dirty detectives who exploited some of America’s greatest problems: guns, drugs, toxic masculinity, and hypersegregation.

In the upside-down world of the GTTF, cops were robbers and drug dealers were the perfect victims, because no one believed them. When the federal government finally arrested the GTTF for robbery and racketeering in 2017, the stories of victims began to come out, revealing a vast criminal enterprise operating within the Baltimore Police Department.

Cops planted heroin to cover up a fatal crash that resulted from a botched robbery. They stole hundreds of thousands of dollars, faked video evidence, and forged a letter trying to break up the marriage of one of their victims to keep his wife from paying a lawyer. And a homicide detective was killed the day before he was scheduled to testify against the crooked cops.

I Got a Monster is the shocking history of the rise and fall of the most corrupt cops in America from Baynard Woods and Brandon Soderberg.

A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin's Press

©2020 Baynard Woods and Brandon Soderberg (P)2020 Macmillan Audio

True story that reads like a crime novel.

True story that reads like a crime novel. very well researched and written.

More About Ivan Bates than Tne Corrupt Cops

Update: I have the audible and Kindle but I am not coming up as a verified purchaser? Oh really? I bet if I gave a 5 star I would.
I am disappointed for two reasons.
1. The information we didn’t know - we, the public should have known and instead was saved for a journalist to write a book and make money. Not cool.
2. While I am upset the journalist withheld info to profit - there isn’t really that much information the public didn’t know. And of course some private information about Ivan Bates.. Which this book seems to be about Ivan Bates.
If you kept up with the coverage of the corrupt Gun Gang Task Force “GTTF” and Wayne Jenkins this is a repeat of the coverage.
I know Justin Fenton is peaking because he also.. of course will have a book coming out.

Only In Baltimore.

If you live in or around Baltimore, this is a book you will get a much better understanding of what the Gun Task Force of Baltimore PD was really like.

Suspenseful

Very interesting read...wonder how many GTTTF cases will be overturned. Really should be a movie made from this. Seemed unreal.

This isn't fiction... yikes.

I live in Baltimore and personally found this to be a disturbing, albeit thrilling book. Those who don't think cops are dirty, give this a listen.

Baltimore city police corruption

This book I found to be excellent. The police involved in all of this illegal activity got what they deserved. By no means were the victims Boy Scouts, however, criminal acts occurred. My heart breaks for the family that lost loved ones because of their illegal actions. It is not a wonder why there is such distrust in the city of Baltimore.

Great Reporting!

Down and dirty details of police corruption! Very thorough and compelling! Everything you need to know about Baltimore's corruption.

My favorite book of the year

I really enjoyed this book. Great story and performance. If you like true crime stories check it out.

Tonys review

As a retired Baltimore city detective Sergeant this book appear to be accurate in its depiction and help people understand that this job is about honor integrity and truth. And this is what happens when people lose their focus. And our job is to make people feel comfortable and safe in their environments.

Great book, good read but with mispronunciations

I'll leave it to you to find better critiques of the book. I enjoyed it and the reader did ok up to a point. I score low for mispronunciations. I could understand if this was the year 2000 and we were all just getting used to getting audiobooks online but I'm writing this in 2021 about a book published and recorded in 2020.

Examples:

1. Anne Arundel County is pronounced "Ann Ah-RUN-dil County", not "Anne AYR-run-DELL".
2. Catonsville (as in the Catonsville Nine) is pronounced "CAY-tuns-ville", not "CAHT-uns-vill".
3. Ellicott City is pronounced "EL-lih-kit" city, not "El-li-COTT" City.

We've got the internet today much more so than before, right?! A simple pronunciation guide provided by the author, forwarded by the publisher to both the producer and the talent should NOT be an issue anymore, I would think.

But, again, it was a great book!