Jimmy the King

Murder, Vice, and the Reign of a Dirty Cop

By: Gus Garcia-Roberts

Narrated by: Marc Vietor

An incredible four-decade account of murder, power, and corruption in one of the country’s largest police departments

In 1979, the gruesome slaying of a thirteen-year-old boy riveted the suburbs of Suffolk County, New York. As the county hustled to bring the case to a dubious resolution, a wayward local teenager emerged with a convenient story to tell. For his cooperation, Jimmy Burke was rewarded with a job as a cop.

Thus began Burke’s unlikely ascent to the top of one of the country’s largest law enforcement jurisdictions. And while in power, Burke botched dire investigations like that of the famed Gilgo Beach serial killings and the county’s MS-13 gang scourge.

Until a pilfered bag of sex toys brought his empire crashing down.

Jimmy the King is the story of the rise, reign, and paranoiac fall of a corrupt cop and his regime. This book will leave you questioning who modern policing serves, who it protects, and who it preys upon and abandons.

Critic reviews

“If Martin Scorsese were to write a true-crime exposé about crooked cops, it would read like Jimmy the King.”—Michael Imperioli, The Sopranos and Goodfellas

“Epic in scope and captivating in detail, the spellbinding story of a massive scandal from its very roots. You will be shocked by the twists in this story and the brazenness of its villains. But you won’t be able to put it down.”—Evan Ratliff, author of The Mastermind

“Jimmy the King is the kind of true-crime book we don’t get enough of: thoroughly reported, and engagingly written, and set in a downwardly mobile suburban world that is too often misunderstood. Highly recommended!”—Nate Blakeslee, New York Times–bestselling author of American Wolf and Tulia

“Jimmy the King is an engrossing, play-by-play account of a law-enforcement scandal involving corruption so brazen it would be hard to believe if it weren’t so thoroughly reported.” —Christopher Goffard, author of Dirty John and Other True Stories

“Jimmy the King is an extraordinary piece of modern reporting that uses the dubious rise and violent fall of former Suffolk County Police Chief James Burke as a window into one of the most vice-ridden and corrupt departments in the country. . . . The best researched and most captivating piece of investigative journalism that I’ve read in quite some time.”—Lauren Wilkinson, author of American Spy

Brave and inspiring.

Gallant attempt to expose the insidious corruption that permeates our local government, law enforcement and judiciary. Thank you for your exposé.

Good listen.

Great non-fiction story. Narrator is really good. I have a feeling this is just the tip of iceberg.

An Unholy Trinity

This was an excellent book, and Gus Garcia-Roberts did a deep dive into the long-standing corruption between the SCPD its IAD and the DA, with its genesis being an unlikely meeting between a young James Burke and Tom Spota decades earlier, and their ultimate downfall.It is a very good read for anyone unfamiliar with the story, but if you are from Suffolk county it is mind-blowing!

Great book about the extensive corruption on Long Island in Suffolk County.

This book shows how much damage one Psychopath in a top position can inflict. Suffolk County is on Long Island and has to be one of the most corrupt counties in America. With a corrupt DA and a Corrupt Police Chief working together, manipulating each other and everyone around them, the damage they did was unbelievable. The book is about a corrupt Police Chief, James Burke, and a corrupt DA, Thomas Spota but is about much more. The title really should have been changed to reflect this. It is about the long standing and pervasive corruption in the Long Island Police and DAs office that trickles down to every aspect of life there. Innocent people convicted of murder, drugs, sex, prostitution, padded expense accounts, exorbitant pensions after felony convictions, bribery, theft, phony police attorneys, corrupt police unions protecting corrupt cops, behind the scenes promotions of the worst of the worst, incompetence, and so many other crimes it is hard to list them all. I liked the book but think some of it could have been edited better to be more concise and chronological. The narrator was very good. Some of it was very well written and other parts not so much. It was like it was written by two different people. The author also misses the point that they were dealing with a classic psychopath in James Burke. Knowing this explains a lot. He is unredeemable and can never be fixed. He is an absolutely person and his prison sentence should have been ten times longer and not served in Allenwood which is considered a country club. I would highly recommend this book especially if you live or have lived on Long Island I did. Also watch the new Netflix Series about the Long Island Serial Killer called Gone Girls. It ties into all this and these corrupt characters are featured in some of it.

Everyday, ordinary, ubiquitous corruption

As I listened to the story unfold, I had two, somewhat connected, thoughts running through my head. First, that, while the book kept my attention for the most part, the overriding theme was the sheer mundanity, and lack of creativity, of the corruption and, in fact, the corrupt individuals themselves. Perhaps jaded by a conception of evil masterminds and grand schemes, all of this seemed rather run of the mill. But maybe that's just the point, it happens all the time, everywhere. Anyone with even the slightest brushes with the criminal "justice" system can relate stories of how police, prosecutors and local government executives can manipulate law to an extent that it doesn't even bear a resemblance to justice . Which led me to the second thought. That many people would probably like to think institutional corruption like this is confined to by-gone less enlightened days, or sleepy backwater Southern jurisdictions. But of course, it is in every corner of society, it's just that some official criminals are more sophisticated than others. But then again, even the top fraudsters today don't require much polish for gullible supporters, just simplistic bromides and caps.