Episode
Homicide: Life on the Street: Bones of Contention
Overview
A body buried for 6 - 20 years is uncovered at a construction site. Munch and Lewis begin the process of trying to solve this old crime. Falsone and Ballard's relationship has heated up, and that fact becomes apparent to their fellow detectives. Sheppard returns to work, but is discouraged when Gee assigns her to desk duty. Gharty tells Billie Lou that he'll attend her bass-playing concert. Munch & Lewis with help from the ME and MGee, identify the body and then begin to piece together what happened to her. Gee lays down the law to Ballard & Falsone: they have to knock it off if they want to stay working on the same shift; they agree.
Details
- Series
- Homicide: Life on the Street
- Season
- Season 7
- Episode
- Episode 11
- Air date
- 1999-01-15
- Runtime
- 45 min
Episode context
Bones of Contention is Episode 11 in Season 7 of Homicide: Life on the Street. It aired on 1999-01-15. The runtime is 45 min.
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Episode 10: Shades of Gray
A white bus driver striking a black female pedestrian sparks a riot. The driver is killed, and some distance away from the riot another body is found. MGee and Gharty look into the death of the driver while Lewis and Sheppard look into death of the other body. Lewis finds a clue at the scene, a button (later discovered to be missing from a police uniform). Gharty and MGee actively debate whether race was the motivation for the driver's beating death; MGee suspects the incident wasn't racially motivated. The bus riders are interviewed to find out what they know. Lewis and Sheppard approach a house looking for their witness (without backup). For her trouble Sheppard keeps hold of her suspect, but loses her gun and is severely beaten. Ballard is recalled from her hiking vacation. Lewis lays down the law for the residents of ""Little Jamaica""; he wants Sheppard's gun returned tonight. The witness Sheppard caught identifies Hellriegel as the murderer, and the men who beat the driver to death
Episode 12: The Same Coin
Gharty has a Vietnam flashback. Sheppard is placed back into rotation. Lewis asks Falsone to switch cases, as Lewis is still unsure about Sheppard's ability to be back on the street in the part of town where their call lies. Munch and MGee work a case where the victim was hit and run. One of the victim's possessions is a knife that has some meaning for Gharty, who later is able to recognize the tattoo found on the victim. Sheppard confronts Lewis about the case switch. She and Stivers talk more... after Stivers, working with Falsone, sees him ""go off"" on a potential witness... Munch and MGee find their hit and run vehicle, a rental SUV, whose renter claims to know nothing of the incident and says he had filed a stolen-vehicle report. Munch pulls the victim's DOD file and---for good measure---Gharty's! Munch, begins to spread doubts with the other detectives about Gharty's Vietnam experience, because the file tells him that Gharty had a less than honorable discharge. A kid, who had stol
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Episode 9: Kellerman, P.I. (2)
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The Internet is stage for a ritual murder, which was staged -- which was staged, or was it? The body is found the following morning and Sheppard takes the call, her first since the beating. Since Lewis can't be found, she partners with Bayliss. Second shift detectives Bonaventura and Austin catch word of the day shift's case. It seems the victim in Sheppard's case was a witness they had interviewed the day before about an online murder hoax. The detectives are informed about another murder that is scheduled for midnight. It's a red ball. The detectives try to put the clues together, but come up with nothing and must wait until the netcast begins before they can trace the killer. The trace is successful, but when they arrive at the scene, the killer has left them a computer with the words ""Ha Ha Fooled You."" Barnfather wants Bayliss reassigned as primary if something doesn't turn up soon. Sheppard goes online to flush out the killer. He advertises another murder will take place at www.i
Episode 8: Kellerman, P.I. (1)
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Episode 14: A Case of Do or Die
Ballard and Bayliss are called to the scene of the mysterious death of a woman, whose body is found at the bottom of a forty-foot cliff. This victim was to be married the following morning. The two detectives work to determine whether the death was accidental or intentional (via murder or suicide). Meanwhile Sheppard and MGee begin investigating the death of a movie patron, whose body was discovered after the show ended and the theater cleared out. MGee mentions to Sheppard that his sister is about to have a baby, which means Gee is about to become a grandfather. Their investigation reveals that the movie patron was regularly loud and obnoxious and thus bad for business. When an overdose of a sedative is found in his bloodstream, the detectives question the theater owner, who was currently in litigation with the victim. Unfortunately for Ballard and Bayliss, their case remains unsolved.
Episode 7: Wanted Dead or Alive (2)
Lewis is transported to the hospital, as is the passenger of the car that MGee hit. Gharty is worked up about women and finances, because he and Flora and their lawyers are going to be working out the financial details of their divorce. Gee & MGee are not interested in cooperating with the bounty hunters; however, Knoll is the only one who can get any information on the whereabouts of Errico from Errico's mother. She has promised to page Knoll when her son calls. (Joe Errico has gone south to Miami.) Knoll offers to pay the expenses of having homicide detectives go to Miami and work with him, but Gee declines that generous offer and sends his detectives separately. In Miami, Bayliss and MGee work with Knoll to capture Errico. Knoll offers to split the huge bounty with the homicide detectives, which they of course refuse. MGee decides that the best use for the bounty might be for the man whose wife had died from the injuries she sustained in the car accident.
Episode 15: Sideshow (II)
Danvers brings news of his appointment to the District Court bench as the investigation of a government official named Janine McBride continues in New York. Their prime suspect Chesley Purcell is dead and her shooter is in the hands of the Feds. The Baltimore detectives investigate the background of Chesley Purcell and it turns up the name of a man in prison who still appears to be running his organization.
This crossover starts on Law and Order S09E14 Sideshow (I).
Episode 6: Wanted Dead or Alive (1)
Bounty hunters shoot, killing the wrong man, as they enter a building where their fugitive---a man named Joe Errico---has shot at them (and subsequently gotten away). Gharty has vague memories of a drinking binge from the night before. Falsone and Stivers catch the bounty-hunter case. Sheppard, during her days with the fugitive squad, had dealings with the head bounty hunter. Gaffney stops Gee and MGee on their way in, Baltimore magazine wants to do a father and son piece, using the wine case as a focal point. Gee is not interested, especially about the use of the wine case. Gharty struggles as he tries to reconstruct the events of the night before. Munch is bothered by Gharty's stories of Vietnam and each grows to dislike the other - perhaps some competitiveness over Billie Lou is beginning to brew here. Bounty hunter P.J. Johnson, who was identified as the triggerman, is charged and placed in one of the holding cells, near some of his previously captured quarry. Within an hour his ba
Episode 16: Truth Will Out
A woman comes looking for Falsone, knowing that he solved a real old case, wants him to look into a case for her from 1972. Her parents told her that she was responsible for her younger brother's death. Despite being three years old at the time, the woman has doubts about her parents' story. So Falsone and Stivers reopen this case, which was closed by Gee when he was a new detective. The reopening of the case makes Gee think that he may not have been totally focused on the case at the time. Their investigation reveals the woman's mother used her as a scapegoat for the mother's crime. Bayliss and Ballard's case involves a body that was shot, but the victim was already dead from a drug overdose. The male sergeant at the scene piques Bayliss's interest, so they get together for drinks. Their relationship doesn't develop, because word is spreading about Bayliss being the owner of the ""In Plain Site"" web site. Bayliss begins feeling pressure about his being different and considers celibacy.
Episode 5: Red, Red Wine
Ballard is annoyed when she finds out that the fact that she had a date with Falsone is around the squad room. Munch has a doctor's appointment and he's not talking about it. Dr. Griscom calls on the homicide unit when he sees a number of deaths that are related by a poison named phosphozine. The FBI steps in on the poisonings and they put MGee in charge of a task force; they consider it an act of domestic terrorism. One of the victims was a priest; two others were his parishioners. Gharty suspects the communion wine. Following this idea, wine bottles are collected from churches around the city. A needle hole is found through one of the corks. A citywide canvassing of all places where wine can be purchased is launched. Gee disagrees with the bureau's policy of keep information from the public. One possible suspect is captured; however, strange as he is, he's not the one. Through an internal leak, the media is alerted and warns the public, sparking chaos. MGee suspects the source of the
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