While playing his part, Pistone could have been seen with the wrong person or been recognized by someone he knew. It was incredibly dangerous work as well. He had to make friends with mobsters and criminals and be separated from family and friends for long stretches of time, even on holidays. He had to tell lies-lots of lies-convincingly, about who he was and what he was up to. He had to know the rules of the Mafia game. Pistone had to think, talk, and act like a crook (he spent two full weeks, for example, studying the jewelry industry). He had appeared in “Little Italy” in New York City as a stranger and outsider, slowly meeting and making friends with a series of mobsters, gaining their trust, making it look like he was participating in their life of crime-all the while secretly gathering vital intelligence on the Mafia and its criminal ways. He shows us how the endless adrenaline rushes of risking your life-and that of your family-change you.Pistone had fooled them all with a masterful acting job that had begun in 1976 and lasted six long years. Spillers delivers with brilliant but painful introspection what living a double life of adventurous deception does to your own character. Charlie Spillers tells fascinating adventure stories unequalled in any other modern memoir I've read. " Confessions of an Undercover Agent is a dynamic, compelling, hilarious memoir by a talented new writer. It will be mandatory reading for all future undercover class students at the Department of Defense's Regional Counterdrug Training Academy." - Tim Rutledge, director of training at the Regional Counterdrug Training Academy (RCTA) If you have never worked undercover, your heart rate will increase and your blood pressure will rise by reading and imagining being in these situations. Confessions will put the reader into the very mindset of an undercover officer. It defines all the principles of undercover work and highlights the dangers faced by our brave men and women who perform undercover duties every day. " Confessions of an Undercover Agent is one of those real-life books you just can't put down. A great read." - Ace Atkins, New York Times bestselling author of The Forsaken and The Redeemers After reading the book, I don't know if Spillers was brave or just plain crazy. This is the real lowdown on southern crime from a man who saw it from the inside. "Charlie Spillers is a natural-born storyteller with one hell of a story to tell. May his exploits live on in the canon of great Mississippi true-crime literature." - Jamie Kornegay, The Clarion-Ledger In a time when the police are getting a bad rap, he's the kind of guy you want on the side of the law. " Confessions of an Undercover Agent stands on the author's skill as an observer, his remarkable memory, and his ear for the conversation of criminals, told in long scenes with plenty of colorful dialogue. In this book, he shares his most intriguing exploits and exciting undercover stings, putting readers in the middle of the action. He capped off a unique career by becoming a federal prosecutor and the justice attaché for Iraq. His final and perhaps most significant action in Baton Rouge was leading a battle against corruption in the police department itself.Īfter Baton Rouge, he joined the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics and for the next five years continued working undercover, from the Gulf Coast to Memphis and from New Orleans to Houston, Texas. But the longer he worked, the greater the risks. His abilities propelled him into years of undercover work inside drug trafficking rings. When on the hunt, his closest associates were safecrackers, prostitutes, and burglars. Working alone and often unarmed, he constantly attempted to walk the thin line between triumph and disaster. In this riveting tale, the author recounts fascinating experiences and the creative methods he used to succeed and survive in a difficult and sometimes extremely dangerous underworld life.Īs a young officer with the Baton Rouge Police Department, ex-Marine Charlie Spillers first went undercover to infiltrate criminal groups to gather intelligence. Charlie Spillers dealt with a remarkable variety of career criminals, including heroin traffickers, safecrackers, burglars, auto thieves, and members of Mafia and Mexican drug smuggling operations. This true story of an ex-Marine who fought crime as an undercover cop, a narcotics agent, and finally a federal prosecutor spans a decade of crime fighting and narrow escapes.
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