Captain Frank Furrillo (Daniel J.Travanti) is approached by police Chief Fletcher Daniels (Jon Cyphers) to head up a commission to root out internal corruption. Furrillo demands firm autonomy.
Heavily in debt gambling addict Detective Harry Garibaldi (Ken Olin) mulls an offer to destroy evidence for very dangerous underworld elements.
Sgt. Lucy Bates (Betty Thomas) and Officer Joe Coffey (Ed Marinaro) arrest Mayor Cleveland's heroin addict/thief son. The mayor (J.A. Preston) and his wife (Rosalind Cash) each want Furrillo to treat their son differently. He struggles like always to find a compromise between the strict definitions of his duty and what is needed to solve a problem.
Officer Andy Renko (Charles Haid) and Officer Bobby Hill (Michael Warren) bust what at first appears to be an African-American gang member for shoplifting from a Korean grocer (Soon Tek-Oh). Simmering racial tensions escalate thereafter.
Detective Neal Washington (Taurean Blacque) and his partner Officer J.D. LaRue (Kiel Martin) team up with Sgt. Mick Belker (Bruce Weitz) to take down crooked city cabdrivers. It turns out to be an explosive combination.
Lt. Rey Calletano (Rene Enriquez) is jubilant about his promotion to captain up until Art Eastland (Norman Alden) - the guy he is set to replace has second thoughts. Lt. Norman Buntz (Dennis Franz) arrives from the infamous Heights precinct to take Calletano's place and like Calletano is left to wait out the uncertainty. But Buntz is less graceful about it.
Any cop show with Dennis Franz in the cast is a better show for it. Rene Enriquez would reprise his role as Lt. Rey Calletano in future episodes of this show. He had his fans but I never understood the appeal of the character. Buntz injected new life in to the show which was sorely needed.
Different things are meant to throw viewers off where the show was really set. Character names like 'Washington' and 'Cleveland' are unsubtle subliminal suggestion that what we are seeing might not be Chicago though it clearly is the Windy City from multiple other indicators.
In this episode there is talk of the Mayor's son going to a rehab centre in Rockford which is a town near Chicago. But there is a Rockford in Michigan, Ohio, Minnesota and Washington state.
