Thirty years ago, a murder occurred about every five days on average in the 46th Precinct in the west-central Bronx (Fordham, University Heights, Morris Heights and Mount Hope). There were more detectives than on any other squad in the borough, but the precinct felt enough under siege to be nicknamed “Alamo.” Angel Franco, a freelance photographer who had grown up and lived not far away, made it a mission to accompany officers and detectives from the Four-Six every day he could, from 1979 to 1984. The next year, he joined The Times. He spoke recently with James Estrin about this project. Their conversation has been condensed and edited.

It should be said that the suspects Mr. Franco photographed under arrest had not yet been charged with or found guilty of any crime. Because of the passage of time, we are unable to track down the fate of these suspects. Criminal guilt should not be inferred.



Q.

Tell me about the 46th Precinct.

A.

I was running around back then like everyone else. Jumping on a plane, going down to Central and South America. People were being killed. Our country was sending in a lot of money and support to help change policies and governments. And when I was running around these places — with M16s and bombs going off — I realized that they call this “revolution” but in New York City we call this “survival.”

I thought, “I am going to go back and start working in the streets that I know well.” From 1979 through 1984, I made a real commitment to stay and try and be in the 46th Precinct every day.

Of course, I had a family I had to support. So, in between shooting the precinct, I would go away on assignment and come back. And the captain of the precinct was always welcoming. It was a “handshake” thing. I never criticized what they did. I went along and kept my mouth shut.

The next thing I know, it’s 1984 and there are a lot of photographs. A lot of people didn’t believe the photographs, because it was America in the time of Reagan and Jimmy Carter. “This didn’t happen here; it happened everywhere else.”

People were chasing the same type of story everywhere else, but this was about a bunch of poor folks — black, white, Latin — trying to survive and trying to make something out of the little environment that they have: just some cement, a fifth-floor walk-up, the projects. And here were a bunch of police officers, doing what the government couldn’t do — keep order. And in between, there was a guy with a camera.

That’s what I did. I stayed there and minded my own business. I sometimes translated for the police officers when they were in a situation where they needed a Spanish speaker. I did a lot of listening.

Angel Franco

Q.

What is it that you heard and saw?

A.

I saw a beaten folk. I saw a people desperate. I saw myself — where I came from and where I am still at, in many ways. I wasn’t experiencing it as an outsider.

When I went home, I could hear the same sirens going from precinct to precinct. I would take the elevator up to my apartment. I would see my son and my wife. I lived it. I would go back down in the morning, get in my car, try to get an assignment and try to shoot the precinct when I got back or during the day. It just became around-the-clock. I had to make enough money to afford diapers and feed my son and his mom and myself, and off we went.

Q.

This wasn’t going to make you large amounts of money, was it?

A.

I don’t do this for the money. I do it because I love what I do. And here I was documenting my community in terms of myself. It was my experience of being a Latin man in America: What do I see? How do I live?

When I was a kid sitting on stoops, this is what I saw. How do I translate that? How do I translate the growing pains? The poverty? And the hopes and dreams of a people into my hopes and dreams? Where do I go?

I am there. And I am still there. I have a lot of relatives living in the same area. And yes, things changed. But I still have a scanner in my car that I listen to, and it still sounds the same: “A shooting in the 46th — In the 41st — A missing child —”

Now there are more reports about the elderly: “A missing elderly person in that area.” Those are the people I probably walked past at one time. Like this little boy the police found one night. Omar Diaz, who was 3 years old, was found wandering the streets. He had a soiled diaper and was walking around the streets at three in the morning. What is he doing now? I would like to find him and find out if he is still alive.

Q.

These are people you knew individually or who weren’t dissimilar from those who you grew up with. At the same time, the police in the 1980s were not doing what we call community policing. It was not a “make friends and win hearts” attitude. It was of a different time. So you were sort of on both sides.

Angel Franco

A.

Well, the police were your enemy. But at the same time, they were your best friends.

I watched officers pick up limbs from the street — and this is when the AIDS epidemic was going full blast. I sat in the back seat with bleeding bodies all over us, trying to get them to a hospital. Women who were getting beaten, abused — the officers were rushing out there to try and stop this stuff.

There were good cops and bad cops, I am sure. But what I witnessed was that no matter how bad or how much bravado, the minute there was a child involved — there they were.

One thing that made me interested in photographing this precinct was that it had a bad reputation. I had to see what this reputation was. I went up to the captain and he opened the doors and said, “Sure, I’ve got nothing to hide.” It was a handshake, you know?

“I saw a beaten folk. I saw a people desperate. I saw myself.” — Angel Franco

I watched some cops die from heart attacks when responding to jobs, and in shootouts. It was like that for 8 to 10 hours, and then they went home. These guys — these men and women — would go through all this stuff; dealing with wife beatings, husband-and-wife disputes, homicides, recovering stolen property; stopping these people. Searching. Getting ambulance calls, getting calls of, “Police officer needs assistance.” A myriad of things. Sometimes, it’s just that someone wants to see a cop on the corner. They called because they need a police officer’s assistance. Or they would call saying there were drug sales on the corner and they didn’t know how to get these people to move.

Q.

What is the worst thing you saw when you were there?

A.

I think the worst thing I saw was a woman get shot in the head by an older man because she had started to date a younger person.

Also a lot of abandoned children raising themselves in the streets because of drugs, AIDS or plain poverty.

Some of the good things I saw were also extremely sad. Like a crib death. Here you would have these big, 250-pound-plus guys running up the stairs because there is a baby not breathing, giving a baby C.P.R., and then crying when they rush the baby to the hospital and the baby doesn’t make it. Then the mother comes in and they have to tell her. Then they get in the car. And they are crying. And you just keep the camera down in your lap and say, “This is a moment where we are all going to cry together.” You know?

There was someone bleeding on the street. He was a bad guy. He was robbing people, mugging people. An elderly man coming home from work was going up his stairs and this guy jumped out at him in the hallway. But the old man got him first, he turned the tables on this guy.

The guy ran out to the street. We didn’t know what happened; we just got a call about a man bleeding on the street. When we got there, this police officer grabs the guy and starts talking to him, rubbing his head like he’s his own boy. And with the young man’s last breaths coming out of him, this police officer is talking. He knows he is dying. And in his last breaths, this young man is asking for his mother.

Angel Franco

You saw a lot of that type of caring. At the same time, you saw a lot of dislike and hatred from both sides. You can’t pick a side, because there is no side to pick. You are in the middle there. And you tell this story of a place. On the map of the world, it is a tiny little spot. I don’t know how these guys did it. And I don’t know how they do it.

Q.

A few of these photos were published?

A.

Yes, The New York Times ran one in the Week in Review every so often, so I would make a couple of dollars. And then I was lucky to win a couple of grants, from the New York Foundation for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts, so it kept me being able to work.

Q.

As I understand it, over the last 20 years, this work just sat there?

A.

It sat. It sat in the closet. I just got all the negatives back. It sat because no one believed it. But now I think it is time for it to resurface.

Q.

What did you learn? I know from personal experience that when you look at work that’s really old, you see it differently than when you shot it.

A.

Yeah. And also, my son was born in 1978. These pictures go back as long as he does. I try and figure out what his life was like. I knew what mine was like, going through those things.

You know, there is not a lot of change in terms of the community. Yes, money was put in there and buildings were fixed. But the drug situation is still there, AIDS is still there, unemployment is still there. And programs that were helpful have been cut. So there are people who are still trapped inside that community. There are people still trapped in those projects. And yes, there are the few who have become bankers and successful in their chosen professions. But then there are those who did not have the luck of a couple of good teachers in high school, like I had.

Q.

It’s certainly safer, no?

A.

It is safer to an extent. But there are still guns and drugs in the neighborhood. So you have a man or woman who gets up very early in the morning to go and make minimum wage so that they can keep their family going. They pray that they can make it up the stairs with their little paychecks, so they can live and provide. If you make it upstairs you are lucky. And if you don’t —

Q.

Are the police any different?

A.

They are younger. I don’t think they are as trusting as they were, even though they were hard-nosed cops back then. I show up to places now and it’s me against them, the press against them. It’s no longer, “Hey, how you doing?” O.K., there are a few. I was just photographing a bomb scare and the guy was taking off his bomb outfit and he said: “Hey! How you doing? I haven’t seen you since so-and-so.” So you do have a few of those.

I don’t know what they are teaching them at the academy, but it is “us against them.”

Q.

You could never do this now. You would never get the access.

A.

Never have the access. Never have a handshake. I think you have lost the handshake thing. You know? You said, “I am here”; you shook hands: and you went out and worked. But no, I think everything changed with Giuliani.

Q.

What is it that you want to do with this work?

A.

It is time that it be seen. It’s tough for me to put together a book. But I think it is time for this to be in book form. And I think it should be exhibited somewhere. I don’t know where yet.

I shot all of this with Leica cameras. Back then, the Leica gallery said: “Come! Show us your work.” I said I didn’t think they would want it, that it’s not going to sell their cameras.

After seeing it they said, “Thank you, but do you have anything lighter?”

So I don’t know if the reception will be the same now. But I am hoping that the story is told of a time and space in New York where people were drowning.