State Street / Richard Whittingham

Sgt. Joe Morrison and his ever-hungry partner Norbert Castor call in political favors, use street snitches as eyes and ears and cover the neighborhood like Jehovah’s Witnesses to track down the two men–one black, one white–who raped the retarded daughter of a mob capo. The mafioso himself refuses to cooperate, preferring his own methods of protecting his family and turf. Then a pharmacist is found robbed and drowned in a 50-gallon drum at his store. Clues point to Uptown, Chicago’s worst slum, and Tommy Bates, a “major street animal”; his whorish, drughead girlfriend, Jo Kane; and Manfred White, a black dope dealer.