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Season 1
- At the end of "Tuxedo Hill", Goren gives a very satisfying verbal beatdown to a corrupt executive on the hook for murder by proxy, as the exec tries to save himself at the last second by turning on his fellow employees/accomplices:Goren: And what can you offer to make up for the misery you prepared to wreak on thousands of people who trusted you? What fanatics do to us with guns and bombs, you tried to do with an accounting trick! Don't you think for a minute that you deserve anything better than they do.
Season 2
- A wonderful Bluffing the Murderer occurs in "Dead". Goren gets the M.E. to report that the last victim, Eddie Ferguson, had his teeth capped and that one of the caps turned up missing. The suspect, Harry Rowan, proceeds to tear apart his entire garage, including checking the drain traps, looking for it. The next morning, when Eames and Goren show up with a warrant the sleep-deprived suspect giggles and gloats that it's not there, and that he never made a mistake. The episode ends with this brief conversation:ADA Carver: A costly mistake.Goren: Harry Rowan didn't make a mistake.Eames: Eddie Ferguson doesn't wear caps.
Season 4
- The climax of "Stress Position". Goren and Logan are trapped in a locked-down prison, trying to rescue a material witness from corrupt corrections officers. Goren picks off the team, one by one, just by talking them down.
Season 5
- Rather unusually for a victim's mother, Eunice Peterson gets one in "In the Wee Small Hours". She gives the reporter a stinging speech about how there was no media interest in her daughter's case until a white girl was killed by the same guy, ending by saying "I'll take your interest now any way it comes, but do not mistake my desperation with gratitude." It is the only moment in the entire two-part episode that the reporter is at a loss for words.
- Whoopi Goldberg's character gets one when she emotionally manipulates Logan, making him think he's about to get a confession, then asks for a lawyer. Apparently it was just for the lulz.
Season 6
- With the entire NYPD scouring the city for her, Eames, having been abducted, trussed up and trapped in a basement by a serial killer, single-handedly MacGyvers her way out of her bonds and the room she's locked in.Goren (to Gage): So, sh-she's trapped?[Smash Cut to Eames busting through a door]
- This episode also shows how downright terrifying Goren can be if someone threatens Eames. When he thinks his former teacher had something to do with it, he practically rips the man's head off.
- Also awesome: to see the whole of 1PP instantly spring into action when Eames goes missing. Within nanoseconds of Goren breaking the news, the whole room is buzzing like a horde of angry bees, Ross is barking out orders that nobody questions, and every police officer in the building is on the move to go hunt the bastard down. "The blue wall", indeed. NYPD protects its own.
- When the lawyer father in "Players" finds out that his smug Spoiled Brat Dirty Coward son was responsible for the death of the victim in the episode, he gives the ultimate response when said son drops the tough guy act to beg his father for help: "Officers, read my son his rights."
Season 8
- The way Goren saves Kathy Devildis in "Family Values". The killer is a religious man who has been killing his family because he believes they're Too Good for This Sinful Earth and would be better off in Heaven (the episode is based on the crimes of John List
). By the time they catch up with him, he's killed five people and Kathy, his teenage daughter, is missing. Goren and Eames believe that she's still alive (because they haven't found blood or a body), but it's winter, and if she's been left outside and they don't find her in time, she'll freeze to death. What does Goren do? He convinces the father that he's been deceived by the devil and God wants Kathy to live. And it works — the father decides Goren is right and gives them the information they need to save Kathy.- Kathy herself plays a role in her own survival. She learns from the radio that he's killed her mother and realizes he also killed her aunt and uncle and her favorite teacher, and puts it together that he's going to kill her too... and when he realizes that she's found out about his crimes, he decides he has to kill her right now. How does she get out of it? She lets him explain his "reasoning" and then tells him that she understands, but she's afraid to go alone, and pleads with him to just let her wait and die with him, because she won't be scared if he's there with her. After considering this, he agrees to her plan, which buys her time to be rescued. Then, when he ties her up and puts her in the car to hide her away until he's finished the rest of his "work", she has the presence of mind to leave marks behind for the police to find to indicate where she's been taken, marks which end up giving Goren key information to use in breaking her father.
Season 9
- In the first part of the two-part Season 9 opener "Loyalty", the FBI is trying to claim jurisdiction on a case and cut Major Case out of the loop. At one point, Eames, Goren, and Nichols are discussing how to question a suspect, when the unit's temporary Captain enters the room.Captain: I sent the gun from the search to FBI Forensics. Maybe we'll get a match.Eames: FBI Forensics? Why them?Captain: Their lab's the last place they'll look. (Nods to himself and smirks ever so slightly as he leaves.)
- In "Disciple", Nichols helps tear down the Serial Killer copycat at the end from his smug attitude into an absolute mess emotionally, and get closure for Stevens in a brilliant sweep that summarizes everything the killer was that his mentor was not. It wasn't even necessary, the guy was already dead to rights for a conviction; Nichols did it for his partner's sake.
