The Ledger

14.14 City Hall

In this episode (14.14), a shooting at city hall leaves a city councilman dead and a water inspector wounded. Briscoe and Green focus their investigation on people who had a motive to shoot the councilman, including a man who was preparing to face him in the primaries. Their investigation reveals that the would-be opponent was bribed not to run by family members of the councilman, who gave him a no-show job at a printing company. The dtectives reasoned that after the no-show job was terminated, he would be angry enough to seek revenge. However, further investigation exonerates the man, and the episode becomes one of those where the apparent target isn't the actual target of the killer: it turns out the water inspector was the intended target.

The detectives interview people who had a grudge against the water inspector, including the elderly owner of an electronics store. Although they discount him as a suspect, they return when they learn he has a younger son matching the description of the shooter. They learn this by setting up one of those enticement events designed to capture suspects, as when the police offer people who have outstanding warrants free TVs. In this case, Briscoe and Logan set up a water tax amnesty event, hoping to entice the suspect to come in, so the water inspector can identify him via closed circuit tv. In discussing the plans for the event, they make reference to a time when the NYPD otganized a "meet the Yankees" event for people with warrants. Now I don't know if this ever happened in real life, but something exactly like this occurs in the Al Pacino movie Sea of Love. The scene involving the tax amnesty event is pretty funny, as Briscoe pretends he is a bureaucrat and he keeps giving circular answers to all the people who come in. In any case, the ruse works, and the son of the electronics store owner shows up.

The detectives get an arrest warrant, and arrest him, and he shows up for his arraignment represented by a probate lawyer who seems out of his league. The lawyer gives Southerlyn a motion to suppress a gun that he says the police found during a warrantless search of his client's home two days before the arrest. Briscoe and Green deny having made any such search or recovering the gun. Southerlyn looks into it, and eventually learns that federal prosecutors got a secret search warrant from the secret federal courts that issue such warrants in terrorism cases. The federal prosecutors refuse to hand over the gun to McCoy and he gets angry about it, but there isn't much he can do. Branch intercedes with an old friend who used to sit on the court, and then an FBI agent shows up at McCoy's office and turns over the gun.

By this time, the defendant is represented by Danielle Melnick, a defense attorney who has appeared many times on the show, who tells Jack he is complicit in the unconsitutiionality of these secret warrants if he uses the gun as evidence at trial. McCoy is unconvinced, and the trial goes ahead. Melnick tries to tell the jury that her client's rights were trampled by the government, but it doesn't persuade them and -- spoiler coming -- he is found guilty.

The episode spends a lot of time in its last half discussing the merits of the secret warrants (permitted under a law known as FISA) and secret courts. DA Branch is in favor of them, Southerlyn is strongly opposed, and McCoy seems supportive of them insofar as they help him bring killers to justice. The warrant in this case was issued because federal prosecutors believed that the defendant was exporting video game machines to Algeria, and the machines, because they are now so powerful, qualify as "dual-use devices," meaning that although apparently benign, they can be converted into devices used for nefarious ends. It turns out that the electronics store was exporting the devices to toy stores overseas because they needed money to pay their exorbitantly high water bills. The bills were so high because of a clerical error made by the water inspector.

Casting-wise, as I mentioned, Tovah Feldshuh returns as Danielle Melnick, this time using a cane to walk. McCoy refers to her as a victim of gun violence, because she was shot in an episode from the previous season. Also, a real life New York judge, Leslie Crocker Snider, appears as the trial judge in this episode, and has a fairly substantial speaking part. You can tell she is an amateur actor, however. There is a stiffness to her dialogue, and she blinks a lot as she's saying her lines. I'm sure she will improve if they bring her back for more, though.

The plot of the episode is interesting, but all the discussion of FISA becomes tiresome after a while and feels heavy-handed. I blame this on the episode's co-writer, Richard Sweren, who I have frequently mentioned here is my least favorite of the show's writers. The last couple seasons, the writers have seem to made a point of having their characters engage in dialogue about whatever political issue is being discussed on the show. Sometimes it is more effective than others. I think I liked it more several years ago when the characters would only do it occassionally. Now, I think they spend too much time on it and make such a big deal about it.

I should mention that the basic story element of the city councilor being shot at city hall comes from real life. Last year, councilman James Davis was shot in the actual city hall chamber by the opponent he had just defeated in the race. He had allowed his killer to bypass the metal detectors installed at city hall.

Posted by adm at February 11, 2004 11:32 PM

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