Prescription for Justice

Wartofsky's latest novel is a competent police procedural with some very unpleasant gore and a disturbingly complacent attitude towards vigilante justice. Dr. Julian Stone's daughter is a victim of a brutal rape-murder. The policeled by Sergeant Vince Imperateri, who has his own personal problemscannot get a lead on the killer, who is terrorizing Washington women. Angered that arrested offenders are being let off by the courts, Dr. Stone becomes a vigilante. Dubbed ""Jack the Snipper'' by the press, he chooses convicted but freed rapists at random nationwide, tracks them down and surgically castrates them. Imperateri's investigation of the rape-murder finally focuses on a likely suspect and, suspicious of Stone by this time, the officer tips him off to his daughter's killer. Imperateri hopes to catch his suspect and ``Jack the Snipper'' together, so that he can retire in glory. Whether or not he will succeed generates most of this book's suspense, but cliched characters and trite attitudes have already sunk the novel. (April 16)