Author Talk–Cop Cop: Breaking the Fixed System of American Policing

The Vineyard Haven Library is pleased to welcome co-author and senior investigator Mac Muir for a conversation about his new book, “Cop Cop: Breaking the Fixed System of American Policing.” This event will be held at 6:00 PM on Tuesday, September 16th at the Katharine Cornell Theatre, located at 51 Spring Street in Vineyard Haven (above Tisbury Town Hall). Free and open to the public. No registration required.

In “Cop Cop,” former senior investigators at Civilian Complaint Review Board (CCRB), Mac Muir and Greg Finch, delve into the hidden gears that turn at the heart of American policing, distilling the complex web of police oversight into a far more accessible story. Across nearly a decade, Muir and Finch interviewed over 1,000 police officers and hundreds of victims of misconduct, and spoke with countless witnesses, policymakers, journalists, jailers, and gatekeepers of the criminal-justice system. The result is a web of real cases, spanning instances of chokeholds, stop-and-frisk, shootings, egregious verbal abuse, bodycam footage tampering, distortion of policing data, and much more.

Combining their unique perspectives as police misconduct investigators, the authors provide a new way of framing the history of policing, tethering a story that begins in the fields of Ireland and the plantations of Barbados, courses along the cobblestone paths of Charleston, South Carolina, and London, England, flows through the heart of New York City, and bleeds into the present day.

Mac Muir was raised in Oakland, California. From 2016 to 2022, he rose to become a Supervising Investigator at the New York City CCRB. From 2023 to 2025, Mac served as Executive Director of Oakland’s Community Police Review Agency.

For more information, please contact the library at vhpl_programs@clamsnet.org or (508) 696-4211.