Joseph Wambaugh put his life on the printed page, a former Los Angeles police officer who turned his day-to-day work into gripping, true-crime bestsellers. The Pittsburgh-born son of a police officer, Wambaugh moved to California as a teenager and, despite having ambitions to be an English teacher, ended up following his father into uniform. He had been in the LAPD for 11 years and reached the rank of sergeant when his debut novel,
The New Centurions, was published. It was a critically acclaimed best-seller, and Wambaugh used to joke that suspects he had arrested would ask him for autographs. Wambaugh was also heavily involved in the production of 1970s TV series
Police Story. Wambaugh’s second novel,
The Blue Knight, was another hit but it was his third book,
The Onion Field, which cemented his reputation as a leading novelist. A non-fiction account of a kidnapping and murder, it was adapted into both a TV series and film and led to Wambaugh becoming a full-time writer. He published 18 books over the next 40 years. Wambaugh won crime writing’s premier award, the Edgar, three times, and was also named a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America. Joseph Wambaugh died on February 28, aged 88. — APL/agencies
