- [Opening narration]
- Narrator: In the criminal justice system, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups: the police, who investigate crime; and the district attorneys, who prosecute the offenders. These are their stories.
- [about gay marriage]
- Jack McCoy: Let 'em marry. Why shouldn't they be as miserable as the rest of us?
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: I specifically asked for him to be put on suicide watch. Apparently here at Riker's that mean that they watch you commit suicide.
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: Even though you are a taxpayer, you know, we don't actually work for you personally.
- Det. Mike Logan: Interviewing suspect: When is your birthday?
- Suspect: March 20.
- Det. Mike Logan: What year?
- Suspect: Every year. I have a birthday every year!
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: Boy, I'd hate for somebody to trace me by what I read.
- Det. Rey Curtis: You read, Lennie?
- [a victim has died, apparently during S&M sex]
- Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: No defensive wounds.
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: That's odd.
- Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: Yeah, the fun part for these guys is the struggle AFTER they've been tied up.
- [pause]
- Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: Or so I've heard.
- [handcuffing a suspect]
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: You've heard of the Seven Rings of Saturn? These are the Two Rings of Riker's.
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: I told you, you should have gone to bed with her. You're getting the grief without getting the gravy.
- Lt. Anita Van Buren: I'd like it if you two became real partners.
- Detective Lennie Briscoe: And I'd like it if my ex-wives got partners. No more alimony.
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: I'm trying to decide what to arrest you for - obstruction of justice, harboring a fugitive or just being a general pain in the ass!
- [looking at a hospital sign that says "Pediatric Oncology"]
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: Now there's two words that should never go together.
- Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: I got another body coming in. Guy took a javelin to the chest.
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: Why are you still in this line of work?
- Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: Free javelins.
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: You know, if I didn't already know you don't have kids, I'd know you don't have kids.
- Jack McCoy: Your grief might seem a little more real had you not just admitted you cut off your wife's head.
- [phone rings, Rodgers answers]
- Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: Rodgers.
- [pause; she hands the phone to Green]
- Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: Your lieutenant.
- [Green looks at the receiver but won't touch it]
- Det. Ed Green: What's that on the receiver? Brains?
- Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: Egg salad, maybe.
- Det. Ed Green: You got another phone?
- Lt. Anita Van Buren: Do you believe him?
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: I believe on a good day he couldn't hit his ass with both hands.
- Lt. Anita Van Buren: It wasn't the eighteen floors from the window to the street that killed her, it was the sudden stop.
- Ben Stone: Although justice must be tempered with mercy, it must still maintain a sense of retribution.
- [the driver of a Jaguar has been shot; a carjacking is suspected]
- Det. Ed Green: Just give up the car! Man, when are people gonna realize it isn't worth your life?
- Det. Lennie Briscoe: Spoken like somebody who's never owned a Jag.
- Jack McCoy: [waiter brings a drink bought by the defense attorney in the last case] Take it back.
- ADA Claire Kincaid: You can't forgive anyone, can you?
- Jack McCoy: Nope. Besides, that was bourbon; I'm drinking scotch.
- A.D.A. Paul Robinette: Could be he's lucky.
- Capt. Donald Cragen: Could be next week I'll be doing shampoo commercials.
- [watching Van Buren and Fontana tear into each other]
- Det. Ed Green: Look, we can sit here and argue politics all day long, but there's still gonna be a dead girl in the morgue.
- EADA Jack McCoy: You can re-write the law when you're appointed to the Supreme Court.
- D.A. Arthur Branch: God willing.
- Det. Ed Green: [a suspect, who'd complained of radiating pain in his neck, tries to escape from his apartment; Green goes to apprehend him] That's good, now radiate your ass up against the wall!
- Capt. Donald Cragen: What'd he say?
- Det. Mike Logan: He told us to go to hell
- Capt. Donald Cragen: Well, at least he's got a way with words.
- Arraignment judge: Life is beautiful. All God's children are innocent.
- Adam Schiff: People see the devil as an allegory.
- ADA Jack McCoy: I'm not so sure I do.
- Abbie Carmichael: Horns and a pitchfork, Jack?
- Ben Stone: Unless the victim qualifies for sainthood, we shouldn't prosecute? Lyndon Johnson tried governing by opinion polls... It didn't work.
