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Law & Disorder

"Law & Disorder"
Homicide: Life on the Street episode
Episode no. Season 3
Episode 15
Directed by John McNaughton
Story by James Yoshimura
Henry Bromell
Teleplay by Bonnie Mark
Julie Martin
Cinematography by Jean de Segonzac
Production code 316
Original air date February 24, 1995
Guest appearance(s)
Episode chronology
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"The Old and the Dead"
List of Homicide: Life on the Street episodes

"Law & Disorder" is the 15th episode of the third season of the American police drama television series Homicide: Life on the Street. It originally aired on NBC on February 24, 1995. The episode was written by Bonnie Mark and Julie Martin and directed by John McNaughton. The episode concludes elements of a storyline about the shooting of Beau Felton, Kay Howard, and Stanley Bolander.

Because he responded to the call about the murder of Gordon Pratt—the prime suspect in the shooting of Bolander, Felton, and Howard— Tim Bayliss is given the unpleasant task of investigating the murder. Despite his protests, Lt. Al Giardello orders Bayliss to question the other officers in the Homicide unit, which makes him highly unpopular among his co-workers. No one in the unit considers Pratt's death to be unfortunate, and they all, to varying degrees, are offended by Bayliss's questions, despite the knowledge that he is merely following orders. The problem is compounded when Giardello, dissatisfied by the investigation's dead end, orders Bayliss to double check the detectives' alibis. Bayliss discovers that Det. John Munch has provided a false alibi for shooting Pratt. Bayliss confronts Munch, who responds by defiantly providing an even weaker alibi and offering to let Bayliss examine his service firearm. Exhausted from having to question his fellow detectives, Bayliss chooses not to press the matter and later convinces Giardello that the murder is unsolvable.

Frank Pembleton, who usually partners with Bayliss, objects to his questions in a more subtle way by choosing to not be his partner on the case. Instead, he takes the case of a woman shot dead in a parking lot, and asks Meldrick Lewis to partner with him on the case—a whim he soon regrets. At the scene of the crime, Meldrick and Frank are confused by the fact that no one saw the shooter or even heard a gunshot, and a witness expresses the opinion that it must be "one of those black kids who go around shooting off guns." Pembleton points out that, statistically, the witness is probably correct that the shooter came from the projects, while Meldrick is offended by Pembleton's assumption that the shooter is probably black. Meldrick also objects to Pembleton's method of starting the investigation by working their way down the list of registered handguns, pointing out that most crimes are committed by people with stolen or unregistered guns. At first, the detectives are surprised when Pembleton's list immediately leads to a woman who confesses to murder. However, the murder turns out to be unrelated to their case, as the confession comes from a woman who had shot her boyfriend two days before, and mistakenly believes that Meldrick and Frank have come to arrest her. They eventually find the perpetrator in the parking lot shooting: a little girl, living three doors down from the victim, who took her father's gun from its cabinet and fired it into the air without knowing where the bullet would land. Afterward, Meldrick and Frank make peace by saying that if they caught the same case again, each would investigate it exactly as he did this one.


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