After a distinguished career combating crime with the New Jersey State Police, Frederick T. Martens retired at the rank of lieutenant. He then served as Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Crime Commission. Lieutenant Frederick T. Martens is the author of We’ll Make You An Offer You Can’t Refuse: A Primer On The Investigation Of Public Corruption, One Detective’s Journey Into the Abyss: Roads Traveled, Lessons Learned, Villainy Exposed, and a co-author of Police Intelligence Systems in Crime Control: Maintaining a Delicate Balance in a Liberal Democracy.
According to the book description of One Detective’s Journey Into the Abyss: Roads Traveled, Lessons Learned, Villainy Exposed, “Being raised in the New York metropolitan region but living in the San Francisco Bay area exposed Martens to two worlds. One was inundated with Mafia and racketeering. The other was the nascent evolution of the Free Speech, Free Love, and anti-Viet Nam War movements. Both experiences shaped his perspective on government institutions and the fragile role of the law in ensuring domestic tranquility.
Only through experiencing the pernicious powers of the Mafia could one fully appreciate the damage that can and is visited on the body politic of a region or a state. With the racial unrest that consumed New Jersey in the sixties coupled with the national attention that resulted in New Jersey being labeled “the most corrupt state in the nation,” did Martens come to realize just how organized crime had become indistinguishable from government. The body-politic was terminally ill; political cancer that had metastasized.
After an impressive investigative career in the New Jersey State Police, Martens was appointed to the position of Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Crime Commission. While the Mafia had extended its tentacles throughout the government, local criminal organizations posed an equally-pernicious threat to the body-politic. Confronted with political retribution from both local and state politicians, investigating the attorney general proved to be the Commission’s death knell. In the words of some, it was a murder-suicide.
According to the book description of We’ll Make You An Offer You Can’t Refuse: A Primer On The Investigation Of Public Corruption, “This book addresses the investigation and prosecution of public and political corruption. It focuses on the investigation of the former Attorney General of Pennsylvania, Ernest Preate, who was convicted of mail fraud and served 15 months in Federal prison. The various political machinations that confronted the Pennsylvania Crime Commission when it decided to pursue the investigation of Preate are used to educate the reader on what to expect when and if he or she initiates an investigation of a powerful political official. The author who dedicated over 30 years to investigating the Mafia, political corruption, narcotics trafficking and money laundering addresses a myriad of investigative conundrums in the investigation of complex crimes. He describes the practical implications of enforcing laws that a significant minority of the population chooses to disobey and the corruption that emanates from this disrespect for the law. The author takes you on an eye-opening journey into the world of criminal justice, which often is permeated by raw political and financial power.”
