In 2001,
Jay Dobyns, an agent for the department of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, known in the United States as the ATF, agreed to participate in an undercover operation that would attempt to penetrate the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club. The mission, which lasted two years, culminating in numerous arrests, ended in 2003, just as Mr. Dobyns was about to be the first federal agent to be patched into the notorious gang. Though Mr. Dobyns is unsparing in his lurid details of biker parties and biker culture, No Angel is at its best in describing the emotional toll suffered by agents forced to live double lives. For it is not just that these men and women have to compartmentalize their two identities, they have to embody their criminal personas. The smallest mistake, the briefest hesitation, the wrong name at the wrong moment, and not only do they put their lives at risk of reprisal from a gang that does not tolerate federal intrusions into its territory, they jeopardize the lives of their fellow agents as well.
Undercover work of this kind is, in the end, as much psychological as it is tactical, as much about how effectively the personal can be separated from the professional as it is about having the right member vouch for you. Enlightening, though, Mr. Dobyns lays on the Christian moralizing a little too thick for my tastes. (3/5 Stars)
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