Hate Crimes
Directed By: Peter Weller
Written By: Tom Fontana and James Yoshimura
Bayliss and Pembleton get the case of a man beaten to death outside a gay bar. Erica Chilton's daughter comes to the Homicide unit with new memories of who killed her mother, which not only leads to solving the case, but also creates new tension between Howard and Lewis. Elsewhere, after Brodie loses his job at the news station, Russert and Giardello hire him to become a videographer for the Homicide unit.
This episode contains examples of:
- All Are Equal in Death: Discussed - Pembleton tells Bayliss he treats all murder victims the same, no matter what they were in life, it shouldn't matter if this victim was gay or not, and he thinks it shouldn't matter to Bayliss either.
- Call-Back: When Kellerman asks Howard what she's doing for Thanksgiving, she mentions she's cooking for her family, and also brings up her sister Carrie.
- Bayliss brings up Adena Watson and how it still affects him.
- Foreshadowing: Bayliss' struggle with accepting gay people forecasts his struggle with his own sexuality in later seasons.
- Get Out!: Lafeld orders Bayliss and Pembleton out of his house when they tell him they think his son might have been gay.
- Good-Times Montage: Near the end of the episode, we see various members of the unit (Howard, Lewis, Munch) celebrating Thanksgiving while Barenaked Ladies' "What a Good Boy" plays.
- Lie Detector: Debbie Haskell (Allison Smith) brings in the latest example of a lie detector to the unit. Lewis is skeptical of it, claiming his nose and brains are enough to catch any suspect, but later, he and Kellerman (with Haskell's help), use the lie detector to get Erica Chilton's fiancée Tom (Dean Winters) to confess he killed Erica. Haskell does admit it might not hold up in court, however.
- Make It Look Like a Struggle: The skinhead informant Jimmy Kruger tells Bayliss to beat him up and arrest him so that his friends won't realise he informed. Bayliss does so enthusiastically.
- Mistaken for Gay: Lafeld's son turns out to be this - while he was more accepting of gay people than his father was (he had visited a lesbian shop owner right before he was killed) - he wasn't in fact gay, though when his father (Terry O'Quinn) thinks he is, he has a moment of I Have No Son!.
- Rabid Cop: When arresting Kruger, Bayliss and Pembleton act totally out of control and tell him that they don't care if he actually did it or not, they'll fit him up to solve the case.
- Taught to Hate: Discussed - Pembleton and Bayliss ruminate on how people in society are taught to hate gay people.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Howard and Lewis give this to each other during the episode - she's upset he went forward on the Erica Chilton murder because it was her case, while he points out it was originally his and Crosetti's case (Lewis even asks Chilton's daughter if she remembers him - she doesn't, but remembers Crosetti), and he's also upset about the fact she's always in his face, which she says is part of her job.
