JUSTICE DENIED
by J.A. Jance
In his 18th appearance, J.P. Beaumont has to cope with something no good cop is ever happy with: vigilantism in high places.
J.P. Beaumont (Long Time Gone, 2005, etc.) sometimes refers to himself as an old warhorse, a member of “an exceedingly cranky endangered species.” But there’s plenty of cunning left in the ex-Seattle homicide cop. He knows it, and so does his current boss, Attorney General Ross Alan Connors, who handpicked him for the state’s elite Special Homicide Investigation Team. Nor is it happenstance that whenever a case carries sensitive political implications, Connors invariably turns to his old warhorse. At first glance the murder of ex-con LaShawn Tompkins seems to J.P. to belong squarely in the bailiwick of the Seattle PD. Connors doesn’t deny that, but he wants an overview just the same, an overview of a particular kind: maximum discretion, no e-mails, nothing in writing, verbal reports directly to the AG, who seems considerably on edge. As his investigation progresses, J.P. begins to understand why. Certain movers and shakers politically close to Connors have been behaving in ways calculated to unsettle a wary Attorney General, ways that suggest white robes, masks and dubious agendas.
A solid, satisfying procedural. No fancy stepping here, but those who’ve danced with Jance over the course of 35 novels have come to prefer the waltz to the bossa nova.