Badge of honor

Murders are on the rise in Philadelphia-but no one seems to mind because the victims are all fugitives with histories of heinous sex crimes against women and children. Worse for Homicide Sergeant Matt Payne, the main suspect is leaving evidence for police to find. But when copycat killings start popping up due to vigilante groups dealing out their own justice, Payne must find out who's behind the chaos before the violence overtakes the city.

"In Philadelphia--suffering among the country's highest murder rates--the tension between the Philadelphia Police Department and its Citizens Oversight Committee has long been reaching a boiling point. That turmoil turns from bad to worse shortly after the committee begins targeting police shootings--especially those of twenty-seven-year-old Homicide Sergeant Matt Payne, the "Wyatt Earp of the Main Line"--and then the committee's combative leader...

In the dark shadows of downtown Philadelphia, the body of a seventeen-year-old suburban high school cheerleader, clad only in her uniform top and with massive bruising on her throat, is found floating in the Delaware River. When Homicide sergeant Matt Payne surveys the scene, he shakes his head at yet another vicious murder in a city that's suffering a record number of killings. And he knows this one, involving the petite, pretty daughter of a wealthy...