However, after the case stalls, legendary detective John Skaggs is brought on, initially to work with Bernal and breathe some new life into the case, though he eventually fully takes over the case. The case is initially given to Armando Bernal, a veteran homicide detective. Though the RHD argues for the case, Wally is aware that such special treatment might actually harm it, so he is secretly relieved when the case is assigned to the South Bureau, which covers the high-crime areas south of Interstate 10. The case immediately draws attention due to Bryant’s relationship with one of LAPD’s own Wally Tennelle works homicide in the elite Robbery and Homicide Division (RHD). On a Friday night in May, Bryant Tennelle, the son of Wallace “Wally” Tennelle, is walking home from buying a root beer with a friend, Walter Lee Bridges, when he is struck by gunfire though still alive, he later passes away at the hospital.

Leovy uses the investigation of Tennelle’s murder to demonstrate that a strong, swift response to violent crime in any community is the best way to reduce it. As a result, black lives are perceived even by those within the black community to be worthless, and black people become fair targets for homicide.

The book’s central thesis is that “where the criminal justice system fails to respond vigorously to violent injury and death, homicide becomes endemic,” and through the history of the United States, the legal system has failed, often purposefully, to respond to violent crime in the black community (8). In doing so, the author examines the critical epidemic of black-on-black violence in communities such as South Central Los Angeles in order to explicate the root causes, systemic issues, and contemporary problems that continue to contribute to higher rates of homicide in the black community in the United States. Ghettoside, written by Jill Leovy and published in 2015, follows the investigation of and trial for the murder of Bryant Tennelle, the son of a Los Angeles homicide detective, through the late 2000s.

Ghettoside by Jill Leovy