COP PUBLISHES CHILDREN’S BOOK

(San Dimas, CA) On July 26, 2006, police-writers.com added its first cop authored children’s book. According to Raymond E. Foster, the editor of the list, “Sergeant Randy Garcia, Humboldt County Sheriff’s Department authored The Trunk and the Tortoise which is the first in his planned series, The Streamer Trunk Adventures.” Garcia is the 67th state or local police officer to be added to the list. His contribution brings the total number of cop authored books to 158.

In Garcia’s book, the main character Hunter is based on Garcia’s son. According to the book release, “Hunter has just completed the fourth grade and is not looking forward to spending another boring summer hanging around the house. When his grandfather, Captain Mike, sails into town, toting his mysterious steamer trunk, Hunter quickly formulates a plan. He stows away in the trunk, and the two begin an adventurous sailing trip filled with peril and excitement. Unwittingly, they stumble across a nefarious plan to smuggle endangered tortoises from the Galapagos Islands.”

Police-writers.com now lists 67 state or local police officers who have written 158 books. The website can be searched by author, department and category. The categories are fiction, true crime, biographical, academic, tactical and other. The police officers listed on the site come from 35 different departments.

Twenty-six writers are listed from the Los Angeles Police Department, giving it the distinction as the number one originator of cop writers. While the New York Police Department is running a distant second, with eight writers, “that is likely to change.” says Foster. Foster added, “we are finding new authors all the time and given the number there are probably plenty more NYPD cops who have published.”