This tiny city has a crime epidemic reminiscent of the Bronx of the seventies. It is also the scene of some of the most ambitious gang raids ever conducted, led by an FBI agent who knows the young men he’s arresting only too well.

The last thing child-welfare supervisor Chereece Bell wanted to see was what happened to 4-year-old Marchella Pierce. The last thing she expected was to go to jail for it.

And that’s saying something.

Five prostitutes disappear. Bodies turn up on a beach. Now the families of the victims have formed a kind of sisterhood. They ask: Who murdered my daughter? Who was my sister—really?

Thanks to a daylight knife fight in Carroll Gardens on April 15, food snobs know that in addition to his acclaimed $24 pizzas, Lucali owner Mark Iacono doles out slices. (Bada-bing!) Iacono’s opponent in the altercation was Batista Geritano, an ex-con with reputed mob links—and as this rundown shows, it wasn’t the first time gangsters and pizzaioli have crossed paths.

One evening, my home phone rang. “You have a collect call from Bernard Madoff, an inmate at a federal prison,” a recording announced. And there he was.

Joe, father, won an Oscar for composing “You Light Up My Life.” Now he faces 127 counts of sexual misconduct, including rape. Nick, son, allegedly killed his girlfriend in Soho House.

The juvenile unit of the New York City jail is a survival-of-the-fittest finishing school for the roughest kids in New York. And an upcoming case alleges the guards run the show.

How do you get through college these days? You and four friends, police say, deal pot, coke, Adderall, ecstasy, and LSD. Until you make a few boneheaded mistakes.

New York City in 1971 might seem seedily romantic today, but in reality it was a battlefield. That year, almost 1,500 people were murdered. Fast-forward to 2010, when there have been only 486 homicides.