See people behind bars -- honest-to-goodness! (8)
I believe the answer is:
construe
'see people behind bars' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this defines the answer.
'honest-to-goodness' is the wordplay.
'honest' becomes 'true' ('true' is associated in meaning with 'honest').
'to' means one lot of letters go next to another (I've seen this in other clues).
'goodness' becomes 'cons' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'true' after 'cons' is 'CONSTRUE'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for construe that I've seen before include "Analyse language" , "Counters (anag) - interpret" , "Counters so as to interpret or explain" , "Recounts in order to interpret or explain" , "Make sense of -- trounces (anag)" .)