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The Shadow System of American Justice
In the heart of South Los Angeles, a tall white detective hands a grieving Black mother her murdered son's shoes. She collapses, inhaling their scent, overwhelmed by a pain few can comprehend. This moment from Jill Leovy's "Ghettoside" encapsulates the book's searing examination of America's shadow epidemic: the persistent, devastating toll of Black homicide. Published in 2015 after a decade of Leovy's immersive reporting with LAPD homicide detectives, the book became an instant New York Times bestseller and National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. Celebrated by Michelle Obama and featured on numerous "best books" lists, "Ghettoside" challenges conventional wisdom about criminal justice with a provocative thesis: the American legal system doesn't over-police Black communities-it fundamentally under-protects them from the most serious crime of all.
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Where the State Monopoly on Violence Fails
The central argument of "Ghettoside" is both simple and profound: where the state fails to respond effectively to violent deaths, homicide becomes endemic. Black Americans have historically suffered from the absence of what sociologist Max Weber called the "state monopoly on violence"-the government's exclusive right to exercise legitimate force. From slavery through Jim Crow to modern urban America, Black communities have experienced a paradoxical form of legal abandonment-simultaneously over-policed for minor infractions yet under-protected from murder.
This contradiction defies conventional political narratives. While progressives correctly identify racial disparities in incarceration and police harassment, they often overlook how the same system fails Black homicide victims. Conservatives who champion "law and order" rarely acknowledge how the legal system has historically neglected violence against Black Americans. The result is a devastating pattern where Black men die at rates that would be considered national emergencies in any other context.
The statistics are staggering. Throughout American history, Black homicide rates have consistently been many times higher than white rates-about seven times higher in the 1930s, twelve times higher in 1940s Philadelphia, and five to seven times higher for most of the past thirty years. In modern Los Angeles, young Black men are murdered at rates two to four times higher than young Hispanic men living in the same neighborhoods. These patterns persist despite L.A.'s relatively small and declining Black population.
Most troubling is the collective indifference toward these deaths. As legal scholar James Forman Jr. notes, "progressives tend to avoid or change the subject" when discussing violent crime. Meanwhile, mainstream media rarely covers these murders, conveying that Black-on-Black homicide is "small potatoes." This silence suggests a terrible truth: in America, these men are considered expendable.
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The Homicide Detective's Creed
At the heart of "Ghettoside" stands Detective John Skaggs, a tall, athletic white officer with whitening hair who deliberately chose to remain in South Los Angeles divisions rather than seeking promotion to elite centralized units. Unlike many officers who viewed working "south of the Ten" (Interstate 10) as career-limiting, Skaggs embraced it, rejecting the LAPD's traditional emphasis on patrol work over detective work.
What drove Skaggs was a simple philosophy shared by veteran homicide detectives: "She ain't a whore no more. She's some daddy's baby." This creed-that all victims deserve equal justice regardless of background-formed the moral center of his work. While many officers distinguished between "righteous" victims worthy of sympathy and those who were victims only in a legal sense, Skaggs maintained that solving murders was essential regardless of the victim's background.
His approach was methodical yet relentless. Skaggs's cleanliness served a purpose-a stack of papers meant falling behind, which spelled disaster with so many cases. Organization was survival. The department's impediments became motivators, fueling an underdog pride. Southeast detectives saw themselves as a MASH unit-better craftsmen because they worked fast with limited resources.
Despite his ordinary appearance among high-school-educated cops, Skaggs possessed extraordinary skills. He spoke in surfer vernacular ("All's I'm sayin'," "Sweet!"), with "dumb-ass" as his favorite term of disparagement. This seemingly unsophisticated style served him well in interrogations, where he played the goofy amateur while concealing his razor-sharp strategic intellect.
When asked why he dedicated himself to solving murders in South L.A., Skaggs explained simply: "I could do it. Who else can?" His father had warned him: "Nothing else matters after working murders." This warning proved prescient-Skaggs became consumed by his mission to make "black lives expensive" by solving these murders with every resource available.
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The Shadow Legal System
The "colossal" problem in ghettoside homicide cases was getting witnesses to talk. In Watts, witnesses almost always pleaded for anonymity, often had to be chased down, and frequently lied or vanished before trial. This reluctance was the primary reason so many murders went unsolved-in 2008, lack of witness cooperation impeded 40% of Los Angeles homicide cases where witnesses played any role.
California's witness relocation program was woefully inadequate-providing only a few thousand dollars for moving expenses and a couple months' rent with no long-term assistance. The program failed to comprehend the circumstances of typical homicide witnesses: homeless people, addicts, prostitutes, and gang members who depended on geographically specific black markets.
Though detectives insisted retaliation was rare, about seven known witness murders occurred countywide each year, with the real figure likely higher. Witnesses also faced intimidation-firebombs, drive-by shootings, and harassment. The $25,000 rewards for information were virtually never collected due to fear.
This witness intimidation was just one aspect of the larger ghettoside problem: a shadow legal system competing with formal law. Black people in Watts were governed by a complex system of etiquette backed by violence-filling the vacuum of legitimate authority.
This parallel system existed partly because of the vast underground economy. With limited legal income, many men "cliqued up" for illegal enterprises from drug dealing to unlicensed businesses. Without legal recourse for business disputes, violence substituted for contract litigation. Young men compared gang participation to how businesspeople use civil courts, explaining, "We pick up the phone and call our homeboys."
The shadow system operated with surprising complexity and nuance. Gang members enforced "rules and regulations" that governed everyday life, with violations punishable by death. One young witness explained in court that he hadn't reported a killing because "the place I live at-there's rules and regulations behind living there." When asked what would happen if he violated these rules, he answered simply: "Killed, shot-anything."
The snitching taboo wasn't merely criminal code but bordered on racial betrayal-a rejection of a legal system that had failed Black communities. Yet this code had exceptions: gang members sometimes turned in their own for killing children or committing acts considered "out of bounds."
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Selling Formal Law
Detectives like Skaggs had to become masterful salesmen of formal law to people who answered to another authority - the street code. "Ghettoside detective work was ninety percent talking to people. Maybe a hundred percent," Skaggs explained. He perfected relentless persistence through various tactics - banging loudly on windows with his flashlight at dawn, returning day after day until people talked just to make him leave, waiting for hours in front of homes, and developing networks of informal contacts who could vouch for his trustworthiness.
In interrogations, Skaggs projected unwavering conviction, presenting justice not just as punishment but as psychological relief. He wasn't solving mysteries in the traditional sense; most homicides were public demonstrations of power with killers who often bragged about their acts at parties, on social media, or through rap lyrics. Names of perpetrators regularly circulated on what detectives called the "Ghetto Information Network" - an informal web of neighborhood gossip and street knowledge - but witnesses remained steadfastly unwilling to testify in court.
Detective supervisor Sal La Barbera revolutionized his team's approach by teaching them to think like Madison Avenue salesmen: "sell ice cubes to an Eskimo!" His whiteboard prominently displayed the salesman's eternal credo: "ABC-Always Be Closing." The most successful detectives, however, offered something far deeper than a mere sales pitch - they provided moral comfort and protection, much like medieval legal officials who developed intricate procedures to coax cooperation from villages where everyone knew who committed murders but feared brutal retaliation. They learned to build trust through small gestures: protecting witnesses' identities, arranging safe houses, helping with relocation costs, and sometimes even attending funerals to show respect.
Through years of experience, Skaggs came to understand that his work addressed a profound need in Black neighborhoods that he'd previously underestimated. Where his trainee Mark Arenas initially saw what appeared to be "acceptance" of violence, Skaggs recognized the reality: ordinary people trapped in a cycle of lawlessness and intimidation. After years working in Southeast Los Angeles, he spoke with deep anguish about "all those innocent people!" - the mothers, children, workers, and community members who lived in constant fear, desperate for justice but terrified of the consequences of cooperation. He learned that breaking through wasn't just about persistence - it was about offering a credible alternative to street justice and demonstrating that the formal legal system could actually protect those who chose to trust it.
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A History of Lawlessness
Skaggs's frustration with perfunctory detective work reflected a centuries-old pattern in American criminal justice. From the nation's earliest days, the legal system was fragmented and crude, with vigilantism flourishing in the vacuum. Police compensated for weak courts through extrajudicial "lessons," and as late as the 1950s primarily rounded up drunks.
The South's history of caste domination created particularly dysfunctional legal institutions. Slave owners wanted unrestricted disciplinary power, and after the Civil War, ex-Confederates murdered their way back to control. This produced what Black people dismissed as "the white man's court"-a system that appeared constitutional but maintained white supremacy through corruption and ineffectiveness.
This "winking" justice system, designed merely to go through motions, made Black Americans "killable." They were "shot down for nothing" by whites, but also murdered each other at rates similar to later northern inner cities-Atlanta's Black homicide rate hit 107 per 100,000 in 1920, Memphis's reached 170 in 1915. Black communities even resorted to lynching murder suspects whom white authorities wouldn't prosecute.
When Southern Black migrants flooded cities like Los Angeles, they brought these patterns with them. But unlike Southern police who ignored them, LAPD officers were numerous and intrusive, deploying mathematically based on crime rates. This meant Black neighborhoods received four times the policing per capita as white areas by 1961. The explosive clash between migrants accustomed to police absence and aggressive LAPD tactics contributed to the Watts riots.
The justice system responded with permissiveness just as Black homicides surged. American incarceration rates hit historic lows in the 1960s-70s, with only a third of California's convicted murderers remaining imprisoned after seven years. The pendulum swung hard in the 1980s, with prison populations soaring and minor offenses becoming felonies, but homicide clearance rates actually dropped.
For Black Americans, this pattern felt familiar-murderers still went free while petty crimes were harshly punished. Unlike whites who had jobs, money, and mobility to compensate for justice failures, Black Americans in poor urban centers remained like an occupied people, settling scores outside a legal system they perceived as hostile.
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Bryant Tennelle: A Life Cut Short
Bryant Tennelle was a talented young man who struggled academically but possessed many practical talents. Despite having attention deficit disorder and resisting medication, Bryant showed remarkable abilities with animals, mechanics, cooking, and crafts. He maintained exotic fish, built lowrider trikes, designed clothes, won cooking competitions, and raised chickens.
While school remained difficult, Bryant worked multiple jobs simultaneously (Togo's, Petco, Jamba Juice, Quiznos) and impressed his parents with his work ethic. Though he failed economics his senior year and couldn't graduate on time, he never complained about his academic struggles and remained determined to make his parents proud.
Bryant was the son of Wally Tennelle, a respected LAPD homicide detective who had made the unusual choice to live in the South Los Angeles neighborhood he policed. Unlike most officers who lived in distant suburbs, Tennelle believed the community deserved good cops willing to live among them. "If you live sixty miles away, it's easier to disrespect people," he explained.
Wally worried about his son's safety in South Central LA, as Bryant had a fearless temperament unlike his cautious older brother Wally Jr., who had grown up during more dangerous times. When Bryant's license was suspended, he began spending more time in the neighborhood and formed friendships with local youth who had loose gang affiliations.
By spring 2007, Bryant had finally earned his high school diploma, bringing immense pride to his parents. With his sister DeeDee's help, he secured a job with the Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks working with youth, potentially starting a career in public service like other family members. The job was to begin Monday after Mother's Day weekend.
On Friday, May 11, with his future finally taking shape, Bryant bought a root beer and strolled along Eightieth Street pushing his bike as evening approached. A black Suburban pulled up nearby. A young man jumped out, pulled on gloves, and fired shots from under an ash tree. Bryant fell under a bird-of-paradise bush with part of his skull blown away.
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The Investigation
When Bryant Tennelle's murder case stalled despite the efforts of experienced detective Armando Bernal, Lieutenant Lyle Prideaux decided it needed new energy. After asking around about who could solve cases in South Bureau, one name kept coming up: John Skaggs.
Tensions between Skaggs and Bernal came to a head quickly. Rather than attempting reconciliation, Skaggs marched directly into Lieutenant Prideaux's office demanding either complete control of the case or removal from it. Prideaux made the unusual decision to give Skaggs full control.
Through methodical investigation, Skaggs identified a crucial lead when the murder weapon-a Charter Arms revolver-was found in the possession of a wheelchair-bound man in Nickerson Gardens. Though the man initially claimed he'd purchased the gun from a homeless crack addict, detectives Rick Gordon and Skaggs eventually got him to reveal he'd bought it from a gang member known as "No Brains."
This revelation transformed the case. "No Brains" belonged to the One Hundred and Eleven Blocc Crips, a subset of the Rollin' Hundreds Blocc Crips. When a sixteen-year-old Rollin' Ninety probationer was brought in as a suspect, he instead became an informant, repeatedly telling detectives "Everybody know"-meaning dozens in the gang world knew who killed Bryant. The murder wasn't a mystery to the community, only to police.
The probationer identified "Baby Man" from the Blocc Crips as the killer, describing him as dark-skinned with "a funny-shaped head, like a cracked egg." Eventually remembering his name as "Devin," the youth recounted confronting Baby Man about the shooting.
Skaggs identified Devin Davis, sixteen, already in juvenile detention for gun possession. A search of Davis's bedroom yielded Blocc Crips writings with the "Baby Man" moniker and a crucial scrap of paper with "No Brains" written on it. "No Brains" was identified as twenty-five-year-old Derrick Starks, a Blocc Crip currently jailed for burglary and parole violation.
The final piece came when Skaggs identified Jessica Midkiff-a light-skinned, attractive young woman with a lengthy prostitution record and a distinctive neck tattoo-as having been in the car during the shooting. Despite her troubled background, Midkiff proved remarkably reliable as a witness, telling the exact same story at every stage of the investigation without a single detail changed.
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Justice and Its Limits
The trial of Bryant Tennelle's killers revealed both the possibility of justice and its limitations. When Wally Tennelle took the stand, he broke down trying to spell his own name, then delivered a heart-wrenching correction when asked about his children: "Three. Well-two, now." He described the night with a detective's precision until breaking down when explaining why he didn't ride in the ambulance-because he "had to go back home and tell my wife."
Jessica Midkiff, now 25 and transformed from her earlier self, testified calmly and methodically despite earlier fears. Derrick Starks made the fatal mistake of testifying against his attorney's advice, claiming an alibi that prosecutor Stirling methodically dismantled. The fatal blow came when Stirling produced a Desert Inn motel receipt from May 10, 2007-the very night Starks claimed to be out of town-bearing his name, driver's license number, and signature.
After deliberating just two days, the jury returned with guilty verdicts for both defendants. As Judge Bowers read "Guilty, murder in the first degree," Starks stared ahead while Tennelle swallowed hard, his eyes reddening, hollowed out with weariness and sadness. Both Starks and Davis received life without parole.
The Tennelle case demonstrated that "gang violence" wasn't an implacable social disease but rather something that could be addressed through persistent legal authority. The case had been eminently solvable-rumors had circulated freely, suspects had talked, and they'd made little effort to cover their tracks. Under Skaggs's relentless pursuit, the murders were elevated to what they truly were: atrocities that must be answered for every time.
The case suggested that if every murder of Black men were investigated with Skaggs's vigor-"as if one's own child were the victim"-conditions would be different. The violence persisted largely because of a weak legal apparatus that had long failed to place Black lives at the heart of its response.
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The Circle of Grief
The murder of a child creates ripples of suffering that extend far beyond the moment of death. For Yadira Tennelle, weekly visits to Holy Cross Cemetery became a ritual of maternal devotion that couldn't be broken. Dressed in her hospital uniform, she would bring fresh carnations and roses to Bryant's crypt, using a long staff to place them by his plaque reading "In Memory of Our Beloved Son, 'Brownie Boy,' 1988-2007."
The pain defied ordinary grief. "It was astonishing how painful a fact could be," with agony "pushing its way into every instant of her life." The hurt was too great for tears at first-"tears belonged to a realm of earthly physics, but the murder of her son had transcended the coordinates of her world." Only later did the grief penetrate "like an illness," affecting her physical health.
Both Yadira and her sister DeeDee found themselves still planning Bryant's future, noticing job opportunities that would have suited him. "Such were the folds of maternal concern that had swathed him through life; they could not be loosened." Yadira struggled against bitterness, telling herself, "Why be mad? Let him rest in peace," though another voice objected: "He did not suffer. She did. The dead rested. The ones who stayed behind did all the suffering."
After Bryant's murder, his father Wally discovered something that astonished him: despite years of cop conversations about vengeance, he felt no anger or desire for retribution-only inescapable pain. At Davis's sentencing, Yadira Tennelle stood and forgave him.
But the lasting image was of Wally Tennelle alone after the Starks verdict, lingering until the courtroom emptied before walking out into the cool spring air, returning to his duty serving "a city that did not deserve him"-a city missing Bryant Tennelle, who personified its best qualities and who "would have been just fine had he made it past the rough adolescent stage."
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Toward a More Perfect Justice
By 2013, Los Angeles homicides had fallen dramatically to 251 citywide, less than half their peak in earlier years. However, three high-crime station areas - Southwest, Southeast, and 77th Division - still accounted for 43 percent of the city's homicides, with victims predominantly Black men between the ages of 18-35. These areas, comprising less than 15% of the city's geographic territory, remained persistent hot spots of violence despite citywide improvements.
Several complex factors contributed to the decline: demographic changes as Black Angelenos moved to exurbs like San Bernardino and Lancaster, gradual easing of residential segregation patterns established decades earlier by redlining, increased public benefits providing economic autonomy to poor Black men through programs like the Earned Income Tax Credit, and the imprisonment of large numbers of Black men. While incarceration did remove some violent offenders from communities, Leovy emphasizes this represents a "rotten and expensive" solution that devastated families and neighborhoods while failing to address root causes.
Despite overall safety improvements, Black men remained disproportionately victimized, facing homicide rates 5-7 times higher than other demographic groups. Legal scholar William J. Stuntz observed that "Poor Black neighborhoods see too little of the kinds of policing and criminal punishment that do the most good, and too much of the kinds that do the most harm." This manifested in aggressive enforcement of minor violations like loitering or marijuana possession, while murders went unsolved due to insufficient detective resources.
"Ghettoside" ultimately offers a profound challenge to how we think about criminal justice in America. Rather than seeing the system as simply too harsh or too lenient, Leovy reveals a fundamental dysfunction: the simultaneous over-policing of minor infractions and under-protection from the most serious violence. She documents how this creates a devastating cycle - when murders go unsolved, witnesses stop cooperating, making future cases harder to crack while eroding community trust in law enforcement.
The book suggests that true reform requires addressing both sides of this paradox-reducing harassment and incarceration for minor offenses while dramatically increasing the resources and commitment to solving murders in Black communities. This means more detectives, better witness protection, improved forensic capabilities, and sustained investment in homicide investigations. Only when the state fulfills its most basic obligation-protecting citizens from lethal violence-can we begin to dismantle the shadow systems of street justice that arise in its absence.
As Detective John Skaggs's lament echoes through the pages-"All those innocent people!"-we are left with a haunting question: What kind of society allows so many of its Black men to be killed with impunity? The answer requires confronting deep inequities in how we allocate justice system resources and reimagining public safety to truly serve all communities.
