Station Under Investigation: Cherold Lane
Tony is ordered to investigate complaints against an officer killed in the line of duty.
Provides examples of:
- Brutal Honesty: Mo tells Tony that he needs to pull himself together after leaving Sue since other people have started noticing that he looks like shit.
- Chase Scene: The episode opens with Norton pursuing David Ringwood on foot.
- Foreshadowing: When Toynton delivers Norton's eulogy, she talks about how he was respected by colleagues, while the camera cuts to Bilton and Standish with dismissive looks on their face.
- Deceased Fall-Guy Gambit: Bilton reveals that Norton did use "reasonable force" when dealing with Keogh, since his death means that his career won't be at risk from taking the blame in Keogh's Police Brutality suit.
- Gratuitous Rape: Tony shows up on Jenny's doorstep after she had told him earlier that she didn't want to see him. The next scene, intercut with the Cherold Lane officers' beating up David Ringwood, at the very least goes into some seriously Questionable Consent territory. It shows the two of them having sex while Jenny does a Thousand-Yard Stare, with Tony seemingly not paying any attention to her. When we cut back to them, Jenny's sobbing and asking Tony why he's behaving this way. Tony flatly states that "it's been a bad day." This never gets brought up again, at least not directly, in the rest of the episode or any subsequent ones.
- Heroic Lineage: The episode ends with Norton's widow accepting a posthumous condemnation on her his behalf. At the ceremony, their son, completely oblivious to his father's colleagues part in his death, says that he wants to be a policeman when he grows up, just like his dad.
- Indignant Slap: Norton's wife slaps Tony when he tries to offer his condolences when he tells her he's from CIB.
- Last Disrespects: Tony balks at the prospect of investigating a murdered officer before he's even in his grave.
- Minority Police Officer: Inspector Toynton, like everyone else at Cherold Lane, is hostile towards CIB's posthumous investigation of Norton, but she points out that, as one of what must have been very few female officers with the rank of Inspector, she's used to facing hostility from her fellow officers.
- Police Brutality: Colin Keogh has brought a private prosecution against the Met
- Pulled from Your Day Off: Tony has his leave cancelled so he can investigate the complaint against Norton after Norton gets killed.
- Shout-Out:
- During the chase in the shopping centre, the band in the shopping centre plays "Puttin' on the Ritz".
- Keogh is described by Harry as having "more form than Desert Orchid". Desert Orchid was a successful racehorse.
- "It Must Be Love" by Madness plays on the pub jukebox where Tony is drinking alone.
- The congregation sing "Jerusalem" at Norton's funeral.
- Jenny listens to "Three Babies" by Sinéad O'Connor while she's reading in her flat.
- "Mister Toaster" by Dennis Bovell & William Farley is playing when Colin Keogh clocks a PC who he thinks is targeting him.
- The saxophone band play "In the Mood" by Glenn Miller in the background while Mo talks to Frances Poulson.
- Treachery Cover Up: After Tony, Harry and Mo find out about the Uriah Gambit played against Norton at Cherold Lane, Harry and Mo are both disgusted, but point out that they can't charge the entire relief, and the truth getting out would only hurt Norton's family and benefit no one. In the end, Tony reports back to Deakin and Huxtable that Norton was an exemplary officer, and no one at Cherold Lane is investigated any further.
- Uriah Gambit: Norton's colleagues eventually got sick of Norton's impulsive and violent behaviour. He may have gotten results but he was becoming a liability to the whole nick. Their solution is to give him "the treatment" by not immediately responding his urgent requests for backup, which directly leads to his violent death.
- Use Your Head: Keogh headbutts his brief after he tells him that the Legal Aid charity that's been supporting his case is pulling out after Keogh assaulted an officer in broad daylight.
- Vehicular Sabotage: The officers at Cherold Lane flatten the tyres on Harry's car as a show of contempt.
- Violence Really Is the Answer: Norton's impulsive use of violence leads to him losing the support of his colleagues, which leads to them opting to give him A Taste Of His Own Medicine by delaying their responses to his calls for assistance.
- With Us or Against Us: The relief at Cherold Lane are quick to close ranks when CIB show up to investigate Norton, with Bilton threatening Headley about offering more than the bare minimum of cooperation with Mo's requests for information. Inspector Toynton openly refers to CIB as fence-sitters and that, while she might be, in Tony's words, "a paranoid and insolent bitch", she at least knows whose side she's on.
- You Do Not Have to Say Anything: Chief Inspector Bull tries to caution Ringwood but he collapses before Bull can finish thanks to the beating the arresting officers have just given him.
- You're Not My Type: Mo's response to Tony trying to put the moves on her after she lets him crash at her flat for the night.
