Not Me This Time / Live-Action TV

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Not Me This Time in Live-Action TV

• In the third season of Alias, Sydney suspects recurring villains Arvin Sloane and Mr. Sark of being the masterminds behind her abduction and subsequent Laser-Guided Amnesia leading up to the Time Skip, and accuses Sloane in particular of being the secret mastermind behind the Covenant. As it turns out, he and Sark are totally innocent of involvement and, in fact, the amnesia was self-inflicted.
• In Arrow, after Sara is murdered, Nyssa immediately concludes it was Malcolm Merlyn. After a three-way fight between the two of them and Oliver, Malcolm insists that while he is a mass murderer, he is not guilty of this. Oliver believes him immediately and actually places him under protection from the League of Assassins (smoothly ignoring the aforementioned mass murder), to Nyssa's utter disgust as she remains convinced he was the one who did it. He technically did it by using Thea as a patsy through the use of a psychedelic drug that made her commit the murder. It turns out to be part of a grand scheme to become the new leader of the League of Assassins.
• In Babylon 5, Lando and Lord Refa were initially partners who worked to turn the Centauri back into an aggressive imperialistic power. However as their agendas began to differ, they began to fall out with each other and they went into the usual deadly politics of the Centauri court. So when Lando's paramour Adira abruptly dies right as she's about to visit him, he doesn't even think to question it when Morden points the blame at Refa, thinking that Refa was looking for payback from the last time when Lando got the better of him, and went after Adira because she's one of the few people Lando truly cares about. It won't be until a full season after Lando has Refa brutally assassinated that he learns that Refa had nothing to do with Adira's death, and Morden did it to manipulate Lando and make sure Lando would be reliant his partnership.
• Better Call Saul: Saul/Jimmy knows that cartel lieutenant Nacho was planning to rob the Kettleman house and steal the fortune that Craig Kettleman embezzled from the state, so he made an anonymous call to the Kettlemans to warn them that they were in danger. When the whole Kettleman family suddenly disappears in the night, the police believe that Nacho abducted the whole family (and perhaps did something worse after taking them), but Nacho insists on his innocence. Nacho mistakenly believes that Saul informed the police about him, and says that Saul has to get the police to let him go within 24 hours or Nacho is going to have his associates turn Saul into a "meat piñata". After awhile, Saul realizes that Kettleman family wasn't abducted at all, they took his warning to heart, grabbed a few basic things, and ran out into the wilderness with their kids. He eventually finds them camped out in a tent, desperately trying to keep their bored and confused kids occupied.
• Happens in quite a few episodes of Bewitched. Darrin usually assumes that his troubles are being caused by his wicked mother-in-law, Endora, who claims to be innocent (or doesn't appear in the episode at all). It turns out to be someone else was screwing with Darrin, or the problem is completely mundane with no magic involved.
• Bones:
  • A mangled body is found in the pin setter at a bowling league Brennan’s dad is in. There’s immediate concern that he killed someone again, but they quickly eliminate him as a suspect, due to an injury that put him temporarily in a wheelchair, which would have made it impossible for him to have committed this particular murder.
  • Max is also a suspect when the Gravedigger, Heather Taffet, is killed earlier in the season. But he’s eliminated eventually because he’s good at killing people but doesn’t have the skill and training to make a long distance sniper shot.
• Breaking Bad: Ironically, out of everything Walt did over the course of the series, it's being accused of the one thing he didn't do that finally destroys his family and ensures that they'll never love him again: killing his DEA brother-in-law, Hank, when he actually did everything he could think of to save his life from the Unwanted Rescue party that killed him. Unfortunately, Skyler and Walt Jr. are long past done with him at this point, automatically assume he did it, and refuse to hear him out.
• In the final season of Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Jake becomes convinced that the FBI has arrested the wrong man in a bombing investigation and believes he knows who the real culprit is. He comes to believe that union president O'Sullivan is setting him up, not considering that it doesn't fit O'Sullivan's MO; he's all about helping cops escape consequences and would never jeopardize a cop's career no matter how he feels about them personally. O'Sullivan actually sabotaged Terry and Charles's kids' candy drives, but that only stood to jeopardize their friendship.
• In the Cold Case episode "The Good Death," the team suspects a terminally ill man was one of the victims of a nurse who became an "angel of death," killing numerous other patients. But the man denies it, saying the victim was dedicated to living as much as he could, unlike the brain-dead people the nurse killed. When the cops press, the nurse points out he's already admitted to six murders, so why would he lie about one more?
  Larry: Lady, I've confessed to helping six people pass on with dignity. I've got nothing to hide.
• Not a recurring Big Bad, but in one episode of Columbo, the killers try to make it look like a repeat offender did their murder. Columbo doesn't seem convinced but pays a visit to that offender to be sure.
  Offender: Who are you?
  Columbo: Lieutenant Columbo. Homicide.
  Offender: Homicide... no, I haven't done one of those recently.
  • He then makes Columbo a cup of tea and explains how he would have done it if it were him. His method would have involved less finesse and more explosives.
• Control Z: Raúl truthfully denies being the avenger to Sofía and Javier. While Sofía herself is quick to accept this as the truth, Javier, on the other hand, is still suspicious of him.
• Defiance:
  • In "A Well Respected Man", Amanda and Nolan confront Datak, suspecting him of abducting Kenya. Datak denies it, as it was apparently too subtle. For bonus points, he practically confesses to the murder of Elah Bandik.
    Datak: When I wish to send a message, I rarely leave it unsigned. It's hubris plain and simple. A character flaw, but one my wife seems to enjoy.
  • He gets it again in "If You Could See Her Through My Eyes", Stahma thinks Datak paid Favi Kurr to boycott Stahma's businesses. He however points out Favi Kurr is far too noble to be bribed, and he wasn't involved in this.
  • The entire Tarr family gets this in "Doll Parts", with all three assuming one of them must have been responsible for Deidre Lamb's murder. Both Datak and Stahma end up agreeing that their son Alak wouldn't have the guts to do it, and Stahma bursts out laughing when she realizes it was their sweet and innocent daughter-in-law, Christie.
• Doctor Who:
  • "The Curse of Peladon": A murder and series of incidents occur at a meeting of galactic delegates on the planet Peladon with the purpose of finalizing said planet's induction into the Galactic Federation. Ice Warrior delegates are present. Based on the Doctor's previous encounters with them, he believes them to be responsible due to some ulterior motive. Jo eventually confronts them about it, but they claim to have abandoned their warlike ways, and in fact suspect the Doctor himself of being responsible. They really are innocent; the true culprits are High Priest Hepesh and Delegate Arcturus, who want to prevent Peladon's induction to the Galactic Federation for their own reasons. And then, in "The Monster of Peladon", a Renegade Splinter Faction of Ice Warriors who want to return to their warlike ways are working as mercenaries for the main villain, an engineer mole trying to divert the planet's mined minerals to a terrorist organisation for profit.
  • "The Five Doctors": When the Third Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith stumble upon the Master in the Death Zone on Gallifrey, the Doctor naturally surmises that he's the one responsible for their banishment here, but the Master protests that, for once, he's innocent. In fact, he's been sent by the Time Lords High Council to rescue the five incarnations of the Doctor.
  • "Bad Wolf"/"The Parting of the Ways": After the Daleks have been revealed as having been behind the Gamestation's killer game shows and manipulating Earth's society for centuries, the Doctor assumes that they must, therefore, also be responsible for the "Bad Wolf" Arc Words that have been popping up all season. The Dalek Emperor, when confronted about this, denies responsibility, and the Doctor realizes that if the Emperor, who has a serious god complex, had spread the words, he would have gloated about it like he did the rest of his plans. The Arc Words were, in fact, spread by the temporarily empowered Rose as the Physical God Bad Wolf.
  • "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday": After the titular "Army of Ghosts" is revealed to be an invading Cyberman army from the parallel "Pete's World", following the appearance of a mysterious "void ship" in the basement of government institute Torchwood, the Doctor assumes that the Cybermen had something to do with the void ship. However, the Cyber-Leader reveals that they had merely followed the void ship through the breach in realities, and that they were not responsible for the ship's creation. The ship turns out to have been housing the Cult of Skaro, a highly secretive group of Daleks.
  • Used for Black Comedy in "Eve of the Daleks". The Daleks announce that they're going to EX-TER-MINATE the Doctor for her actions against the Dalek race. The Doctor naturally quips, "Which one?" Turns out it was using the Flux to destroy the entire Dalek warfleet in the previous episode, which the Doctor points out in vain was actually a Sontaran plot.
• On one episode of Dracula: The Series, the title vampire encounters the heroes in a crypt when the casket opens. A minor character climbs out and reveals that he was turned into a vampire. Dracula replies "Don't look at me. He's not my type."
• Drake & Josh: When Mrs. Hayfer finds her convertible parked in the middle of her classroom, she immediately accuses Drake of being the one who put it there. Drake protests that he's not responsible for this, despite the fact that his sweater is found in the car and having a history of elaborate pranks. Doesn't help that she has a vocal and self-admitted hatred for Drake. It eventually turns out it wasn't Drake, but perfect student Mindy, who was outraged that Mrs. Hayfer had dared give her a B grade on a test. Upon this revelation, Mrs. Hayfer apologizes to Drake (very reluctantly), but immediately declares this changes nothing about her hatred of him.
  • In another episode, the boys steal a Peruvian Puff Pepper that Megan was going to use for her salsa in a contest, and use the pepper for their own salsa instead. The boys win briefly, but are disqualified when the pepper turns out to be dangerous, so their prize immediately goes to Megan. Knowing the prankster she usually is, Drake and Josh accuse her of setting them up to fail, but she insists she is not smart enough to enact a plan that complex.
• Inverted in Drop the Dead Donkey after Damien has sabotaged the dinner where Helen introduces her girlfriend to her colleagues, Joy stages an accident in the resulting confusion.
  Damien: ... and then you "accidentally" hit me in the face, five times?
  Henry: No, one of them was me and you deserved it.
• In The Dukes of Hazzard episode "Boss Behind Bars", Uncle Jesse is nearly killed in a car crash during a race. The Dukes' quick inspection of the vehicle shows that someone has tampered with the steering wheel mechanisms. All eyes soon go to the corrupt Boss Hogg, who was checking out Jesse's car earlier for signs of cheating. Hogg is quick to claim that he wouldn't do something that would get his old friend killed, but even Hogg's frequent co-conspirator, Sheriff Roscoe, declares that he can't look the other way this time, and arrests him. It turns out that the true culprits are the Beaudry clan, who wanted Hogg out of the way so they could steal his moonshine still.
• Elementary
  • A non-villainous example. When Watson's boyfriend Andrew gets an offer of a job in Copenhagen, Watson is convinced that it's a ploy by Sherlock to get rid of him. Sherlock rightly insists he's innocent, telling Watson he likes Andrew even though they didn't hit it off initially, and has no reason to get rid of him.
  • Played straight in the first season. Sherlock believes that Irene Adler was murdered by a Serial Killer known as "M." due to the circumstances of her death matching M.'s very specific method of killing. When he finally tracks down M., aka Sebastian Moran, Moran claims he couldn't have killed Adler - he was doing six months in prison for an unrelated assault charge at the time, which Sherlock is able to confirm by contacting the prison.
  • The trope happens to the same man in the season 3 finale and season 4 premiere. Sherlock believes Jonathan Bloom may have murdered a missing female junkie because he was a suspect in two similar murders as well as the earlier murder of his wife. Bloom claims the woman attacked him and stole his stash, which is supported by his arm being in a sling and confirmed when Sherlock finds the woman dead of an overdose. Later, a sort of reverse chronological variation happens. Bloom tells Sherlock he has a predilection for beating young women in exchange for supplying them with drugs and that he accidentally beat two of these women to death, but insists he didn't kill his wife. He shoots himself in front of Sherlock immediately afterwards. Sherlock and Watson investigate and determine that Bloom's wife was killed by a human trafficker she was targeting in a failed revenge plot.
• In one episode of EvenStevens: A prankster who happens to look exactly like Louis is visiting from another school, and Louis keeps getting blamed for his pranks. Louis is less upset about this though, and more upset about the fact that the imposter's shoddy and juvenile pranks are ruining his reputation as a master prankster.
• Family Matters
  • An explosion happens in the high school chemistry lab, and Urkel is nearby. Urkel is blamed but protests innocence. The Winslows actually believe and defend him, since they know that while Urkel is very disaster-prone, he has never once denied involvement in one of his accidents. It was another student trying to frame Urkel.
  • Another episode has Steve believing that he's being the target of a criminal, stating that he saw a face peeking into his bedroom window late at night. Upon stating this, everybody turns to Myra, who immediately claims, "I stopped doing that a while ago."
• Fargo: Season Four: Josto Fadda has done some really bad things throughout the season, including ordering the murder of a child and scheming to have his brother killed by a rival gang. He is then accused of setting up the murder of his own father, the previous Don. The audience knows that he is innocent of that crime, but there is such strong evidence against him that the other mobsters do not believe his protestations. Josto has stepped over the line so much that no one who can save him believes that he did not do it this time.
• Farscape:
  • John suddenly wakes up on Earth, with everybody claiming he was just in a coma since the pilot episode. Though he has many suspects (The Ancients, Maldis, Delvians...), he zeroes in on Scorpius when he finds that, aside from the Scorpius playing the drums (It Makes Sense in Context, actually no it doesn't) there's a second Scorpius only he can see. But Scorpius protests his innocence, and he's telling the truth.
  • Happens a whole bunch of times in season 4 after Scorpius joins our heroes on Moya; John initially blames everything on him. Happens again in "The Peacekeeper Wars".
• The very first King's Landing scene in Game of Thrones has Queen Cersei and Ser Jaime Lannister discussing Jon Arryn's death, and though it's not obvious until later, their conversation is essentially this. Several characters in-story conclude that the Lannisters killed him (the Lannisters do have a good reason to want Jon Arryn dead, since he's recently figured out that Jaime and Cersei are engaging in Twincest and her children were all fathered by him and not King Robert Baratheon), but this all turns out to be a Red Herring; the real culprits are Arryn's own wife Lysa and Littlefinger, who framed the Lannisters because he wanted to stir up conflict between them and the Starks. It makes sense, too; as the queen's house and the king's biggest creditor, the Lannisters are in essentially as commanding a power position as you can possibly imagine, and the ensuing War of the Five Kings destabilizes the kingdom, the exact opposite of what the ruling faction would want. Ironically, Grand Maester Pycelle, who's a Lannister lackey, also assumed that Cersei had Arryn poisoned, and made sure to accelerate his death when he was in his care.
• Hawaii Five-0:
  • In the episode "Ho'opa'i", undercover cop Reggie Williams and his family are attacked and his wife killed after his cover inside mobster Jimmy Cannon's organization is blown. Cannon of course denies any involvement; Williams goes rogue and swears revenge, but comes to believe Cannon is telling the truth. It turns out it was Cannon's son acting without his father's knowledge.
  • In "Na hala a ka makua", a man named Roy Parrish convicted of murder escapes while being transported to prison and forces McGarrett and Williams at gunpoint to help him clear his name. He admits his guilt over a bank robbery for which he'd served his time and claims he was chosen as a patsy for that reason. He's able to clear his name, but is killed by the real killers in the process.
• In the Hercules: The Legendary Journeys episode "Hercules on Trial", Hercules is Arrested for Heroism. Ares visits him in his cell to gloat, but when he is accused of setting this up, he clarifies that he had done nothing and the humans arrested him on their own.
• Homicide: Life on the Street: After Bolander, Howard, and Felton are shot while serving an arrest warrant on Glenn Holton, a pedophile suspected of killing a child, Holton naturally becomes the main suspect for the shooter. Holton goes on the run until the police finally manage to corner him and take him in. When Pembleton and Bayliss question him, Holton desperately confesses to the shooting after it becomes clear they won't listen to his claims of innocence; however, he gets the exact location of the shooting wrong, proving he's not the shooter. Unfortunately for him, he's still arrested, since evidence proving he had killed the child had been discovered during a search of his apartment.
• House:
  • In the episode "5 To 9", when it's discovered that someone's been altering shipments to the pharmacy to steal meds, Dr. Cuddy's first question is...
    Cuddy: Was it the whole shipment or just one med?
    Oscar: Just one.
    Cuddy: Vicodin?
    Oscar: No, pseudoephedrin tablets.^note The thief turns out to be a lab tech running a meth lab. Recovering (at the time) Vicodin addict Dr. House had nothing to do with it.
  • Wilson once won a prank war with House in Season 2 by filing halfway through his cane, causing him to collapse in the hallway. The same thing happens in the same hallway in Season 3.
    Wilson: [deadpan] Not me this time.
    House: I know! It's your damn dog! He chews on everything!
  • When House and Wilson move into their new condo in Season 6, each accuses the other of pulling the latest series of pranks on him, and each insists he didn't do it this time. House eventually comes to suspect every one of his employees, who all have reasons to hate him, and it turns out to be Cuddy's new boyfriend Lucas.
  • Subverted when Foreman accuses House of pretending to be him and cancelling his job interview. House denies it and accuses Cuddy, who accuses Wilson, who accuses Cameron. They eventually figure out that it really was House and he wanted them "chasing ghosts".
• iCarly (2021): The second episode, titled "iHate Carly," has Carly arrange a meet up with a person who has been relentlessly trolling her online. While at the coffee shop, she runs into her old nemesis Nora Dershlit, a Loony Fan who abducted Carly and her friends in two episodes of the original show. Nora denies being the troll and claims to have redeemed herself. Carly then meets a guy named Justin while getting a banana nut muffin to go, and splitting it with him. After Carly leaves, Justin is asked how the muffin was. He replies, "Do better", the phrase with which Carly's troll ends all of their posts. Carly would eventually find out the truth after inviting him to her apartment. While he's in the bathroom, Millicent begins liking all of the troll's posts. Justin's phone, which is in his coat pocket, plays a notification chime after every like.
• The InBESTigators
  • In the first episode, after a montage of times that Kyle was responsible for Ezra getting hit in the head with a ball, prompting an angry "Kyle!", the present day smack turns out to be someone else's fault and Kyle is quite indignant to be blamed.
  • Happens with Kyle again in "The Case of the Unhappy Camper", when his pranking antics get him fingered for stealing the principal's phone, sticking it in the rice and damaging it; it was someone else entirely.
• Japanese Police Procedural Kochira Hon-Ikegamisho had a number of reformed criminal characters who would often be questioned following crimes that resembled their earlier ones.
• On an episode of Law & Order, a mob boss takes a plea deal from DA Jack McCoy for a murder charge to protect his son, who was the real killer. As he's being led away, he congratulates Jack for convicting him on the one murder he *didn't* commit.
• Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
  • One episode has Casey Novak attacked while working the case of a serial rapist. Benson and Stabler initially suspect the same man who they're already looking at for the rapes, but while he does turn out to be the rapist, it turns out he had nothing to do with the assault on Casey; she was attacked by the brother of one of the victims in the case, who was angry at Casey for getting his sister involved in the case because it meant that people would find out she's not a virgin, and he sees that as shameful and doesn't want anyone to know.
  • In another episode, two daughters from a traditional Christian family are raped, and the detectives suspect their oldest brother, who turns out to have a history of sexual assault. However, while the brother clearly has issues that need to be (and haven't been) addressed, he didn't rape his sisters; it was the family's pastor.
  • The episode "Quarry" the remains of a long-dead child are found, and it is believed he was the victim of a serial rapist and murderer on death row (set to be executed soon). When confronted about it, he denies having anything to do with it. He confesses to multiple other children, but insists this one was not him. He had nothing to do with this murder, at least not directly - one of his many victims is responsible.
• On Limitless a bomber admits that he is the notorious bombmaker/contract killer they've been looking for and he planned on killing the journalist whose supposed car accident the FBI is investigating, but he didn't do it. It was a legitimate car accident which took place before the planned assassination point caused by the victim having a stroke caused by an engineered virus he'd been exposed to, a virus meant for someone else.
• Lucifer
  • When Trixie starts using variations of swear words to try to avoid getting in trouble on a technicality, Chloe immediately assumes it was Lucifer who gave her the idea. He did do it, and unashamedly confesses, but insists that "motherflunker" was Trixie's own creation.
  • Chloe understandably assumes Lucifer ordered the stripper at her birthday party. In fact it was Ella, which isn't any more surprising.
• In The Mentalist, a serial abductor/killer, known as the balloon killer, was suspected of kidnapping a child. However, after shooting him, he implies (and Jane confirms via phone and a note) that this time, he's innocent.
• In Monk, Dale "The Whale" Biederbeck III is suspected of arranging for death row inmate Ray Kaspo to be poisoned 45 minutes before execution because he hadn't paid off a debt. However, both Monk and Dale know that Dale wouldn't stoop as low as to kill someone/arrange for someone to be killed for not paying their debts, especially if the sum in question was in the low thousand dollar range. Fortunately, the real killer is the prison librarian Sylvia Fairborn, and Kaspo was a collateral target; Sylvia's target was recently deceased billionaire Lambert Lawson (who died from kidney failure and was also in the middle of a libel suit against Sylvia's son J.T. DeMornay who wrote a book on him). The only reason she had to kill Kaspo is because he held the ultra-rare blood type needed to save Lawson's life, which is the reason why she gave Kaspo enough poison to destroy all of his internal organs.
• In the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode The Dead Talk Back:
  Detective: What [were you arrested] for?
  Crow: [as suspect] Crossbow killing... but I had nothing to do with this one!
• NCIS:
  • In Season Three's "Frame-Up", Tony is framed for a murder, and one of the first people he suspects is Ziva.
    Tony: You set this up, didn't you?
    Ziva: I would never... all right, maybe I would - but, I didn't.
  • In Season Six's "Murder 2.0", McGee enters the squad room and Tony tells him to run for his life. McGee asks Tony what horrible thing he did; Tony laughs indignantly, then immediately concedes that he's the obvious suspect, but this time...
    Ziva: MCGEE!
    Tony: Too late.
• The NCIS: Los Angeles episode "Exit Strategy" had the NCIS team thinking that the Sudanese dictator Khaled was responsible for the attempted assassination of Jada, his sister who had defected to America in his previous appearance, as he had the strong motive of keeping her silent in regard to his abuse of human rights in the region. However, when they contact him, he denies the attempt on his sister's life, citing that even he would not harm family, although the NCIS doesn't buy it. Turns out, the actual party responsible for the attempted assassination (or at least the one most directly responsible) was the CEO of an international French company that was also involved in Khaled's dictatorship, as Jada's exposure of Khaled's human rights abuses would also result in an investigation on their company and result in a tribunal against them, with France also potentially getting into deep trouble.
• Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide: Loomer is accused of vandalism and protests that he's innocent, even while admitting he doesn't know what he's being accused of. Ned notes that when you regularly lie to the teachers, they won't believe you when you're actually telling the truth.
• NUMB3RS: In "Structural Corruption", The Dragon confesses to Cutting Corners in the building of a skyscraper and attempted murder, but truthfully denies killing the architectural student who was trying to draw attention to the building's flaws.
  Bob: You mean that college kid? Yeah. Look, at worst, they were talking about maybe buying him off.
  Alan: So what happened? You, uh, threw him off a bridge instead.
  Bob: Well, I'm not saying it might not have come to that, but he beat us to the punch.
  Alan: So it comes down to are you willing to take the fall, or are you going to give up who ordered the hit?
  Bob: All right, get me a lawyer and the DA, something in writing. I'll give you everything — except that kid. That is not on me.
• Once Upon a Time:
  • In "The Cricket Game", someone has framed Regina for Archie's murder. Emma, Snow, and Charming conclude that Gold is responsible and storm into his shop.
    Gold: Nice to see your memory's still intact, dearie, but this time, I'm afraid I'm going to have to disappoint you. It wasn't me.
  • By extension, this applies to Regina as well. She really is innocent and is genuinely trying to change, but no one is willing to believe it. Unfortunately, it gives Cora the opportunity take advantage of the situation.
  • Again in season three, Regina is blamed for reenacting the curse when it wasn't her, it was Snow, in order to return to Storybrooke and find Emma in order to defeat Zelena. She says outright that she's as clueless as any of them.
  • In season six, Belle is dosed with magic that speeds up her pregnancy and everyone assumes Gold did it, since he had pretty compelling motivation to — Belle was going to keep their child away from him but changing the game would give him the opportunity to abduct the child. He wasn't involved at all. In fact, he even figures out who the real culprit is while no one else is even looking for another suspect, but he doesn't bother protesting his innocence or trying to convince anyone who did do it because he knows no one will believe him.
• Only Murders in the Building: About halfway through the first season, it's revealed that Theo Dimas accidentally killed Zoe, and he and his father let Oscar take the fall, blackmailing Tim into staying quiet by threatening his life as well as Mabel's. Tim is murdered a decade later, and is revealed to have been working tirelessly to expose the Dimases—not just for what they did to Zoe and Oscar, but also for their decades-long history of stealing jewelry out of their family funeral home and selling it on the black market. The heroes rather naturally suspect the Dimases and the cops arrest them... and then it turns out they have a solid alibi for Tim's death, and really had nothing to do with that. Oscar can't help but relish the Laser-Guided Karma of them getting falsely accused.
• In the Vampire Diaries spin-off The Originals, Klaus, main character and alternatively Anti-Hero or Anti-Villain depending on the episode, faces this when Tyler Lockwood shows up and suggests that Klaus might be willing to use his unborn baby to create an army of hybrid vampire/werewolves, which he tried to do before with someone else's blood. Klaus is outraged that his own brother would even suspect him of this, even given his known habit of being a bastard.
• Subverted on Overhaulin'. The show once relieved a mark of both her daily driver and her work truck and tricked out both. At the end, they presented her with her customized work truck, but claimed they had nothing to do with her daily driver's theft. After she went to get ready for a photo shoot, they brought out her customized daily driver.

• In The Pinkertons episode "Mudd and Clay", Jeremiah Mudd is accused of a still fire that killed 13 people, with the only question being whether the fire was deliberate or an accident caused by gross negligence. Mudd insists that he's innocent; he builds his stills to last, and he found evidence that the fire was caused by sabotage. He's telling the truth.
• Ruyi's Royal Love in the Palace: Yuyan does many horrible things over the course of the series, but Jingsi's death is one of the few deaths she isn't responsible for. By this point no one believes her claims of innocence.
• Smallville:
  • "Bound": When Lex sleeps with a woman and he wakes up to find her dead body in bed next to him he immediately suspects Lionel is involved somehow, but Lionel assures him he's not, and he's actually telling the truth.
  • In "Pariah", people start getting viciously assaulted from behind in locked rooms and other enclosed spaces. Everyone accuses Alicia Baker, as she can teleport and is a previously established psycho. Alicia protests that she has been cured of her insanity, and in fact, has an alibi for one of the attempts - she was with the town sheriff. Eventually, Alicia gets assaulted and killed by the real culprit, Tim Westcott, a man with Super-Strength and the ability to transform into living sand, which was how he entered those locked rooms. When Clark found out, he wasn't happy...
  • "Sneeze": Lex believes Lionel is the one that's having someone follow him, and doesn't believe when Lionel assures that it isn't.
  • "Kara": Lex is fully certain that he didn't set up the bomb in Lana's car, but bides his time in prison until Lionel sets up a fall guy.
  • "Veritas": Lionel tells Chloe he didn't kill Patricia. But of course, she doesn't believe him, as he also killed Patricia's father.
• Star Trek: The Next Generation:
  • The Borg are introduced this way. In the season 1 finale, "The Neutral Zone", Starfleet learns that starbases from both sides of the Federation/Romulan Neutral Zone have been destroyed, with each side suspecting the other of doing so, though the Romulans realize that some other threat was behind these attacks, since the scale of destruction was too advanced for Starfleet. In season 2's "Q Who", after Q sends the Enterprise deep into the Delta Quadrant, they see other worlds with similar signs of destruction before encountering the Borg themselves, thus confirming the true perpetrators.
  • In "Déjà Q", Q has gotten stripped of his omnipotent powers, but the Enterprise crew thinks he's behind the collapse of an alien world's moon.
  • In "True Q", Q creates a couple of imminent disasters on the Enterprise to test the powers of Amanda Rogers. When a disaster occurs later on the planet below, Picard asks if it's Q's doing, but he replies "Not this time, Picard" and vanishes.
  • "Timescape" has a variation of this. Picard, Troi, Data, and La Forge are returning from a conference and encounter the Enterprise and a Romulan vessel, apparently frozen in a temporal field. At first, it looks very much like the two ships are fighting and the Romulans have both attacked and boarded the Enterprise, a suspicion that is only strengthened when they investigate the inside of the ship and find that Riker is unconscious, and worse, Dr. Crusher has been shot at close-range by a Romulan soldier (the temporal freezing the only reason she likely survives). Eventually, after a way to reverse the temporal freezing is discovered, the more complicated truth emerges: The Enterprise was responding to a distress call from the Romulan vessel and helping them evacuate the ship, the true culprits in the case being shapeshifting aliens posing as Romulans. (The soldier had tried to fire on one of the imposters; Crusher had simply gotten in the way.)
  • In "Firstborn", Lursa and B'Etor of the House of Duras are suspected of an assassination attempt against Worf. It turns out that a future version of Alexander, Worf's son, had traveled back in time to stage this attempt so as to motivate the young Alexander to become a Klingon warrior.
• Star Trek: Deep Space Nine:
  • In "Q-Less", Q is the target of suspicion for the Negative Space Wedgie that is threatening to destroy the station. Turns out he really is innocent this time: the Wedgie is coming from an artifact that Vash and Quark are auctioning off.
  • In "Who Mourns for Morn?", when one of the title character's former fellow gang members asks the others which one killed him, none of them have a clue who did it. Turns out nobody did.
• The Suite Life of Zack & Cody/The Suite Life on Deck:
  • Towards the end of "The Ghost of Suite 613," Cody, Maddie, London, Esteban and Arwin explain they pranked Zack to get back at him for all the pranks he's pulled on them. London complains about a time when he sent her a fake love letter from Orlando Bloom:
  Zack: I never sent you any letter.
  (beat)
  Maddie: (cracking up) Okay, that one was me.
  • Moseby fell victim of a prank and blamed Zack, who denied it, saying it wasn't his style and mentioning things he usually does. When the real culprit was revealed to be Alex Russo, Zack expected Moseby to apologize but Moseby instead pointed out Zack had previously confessed to pranks he had yet to be punished for.
  • When Zack is accused of stealing jewellery, Moseby comes to his defense with a massively backhanded endorsement of his character, reciting a long list of Zack's character flaws before finally concluding "but he is not a thief". That may technically be true, but he did attempt to steal hotel towels from Jesse McCartney's room in The Suite Life of Zack & Cody.
  • In another episode Moseby believes that Zack is responsible for cracking a window and flooding a bar. Moseby is proven wrong when a friend of Zack shows that he helped him film a music video at the time the window broke.
• In Suits, when a rival firm steals associates from Pearson Hardman, Jessica and Harvey understandably but incorrectly assume Louis is helping them. By this point, Louis has eroded Harvey's trust so much from his actual transgressions that Harvey doesn't care whether or not Louis is guilty of this one.
• Ultraman Dyna have the bumbling Terrible Trio of Mijir Aliens, who attempted to conquer earth twice, only to fail hilariously both times. So in the spinoff interquel Ultraman Dyna: The Return Of Hanejiro when the Mijirs are spotted in town shortly after a monster invasion is fended off, Super GUTS naturally puts them under arrest, only to find out the invasion to be from another alien race, the Wanzetto. And they'll have to forge an Enemy Mine with the Mijirs after Dyna suffered a defeat.
• In The Vampire Diaries, season 3 has the council getting mysteriously blown up at the end of its first episode. Next episode, both the Sheriff and Elena go to ask Damon if he did it... much to his irritation, since for once, he has nothing to do with that.
  • The season 1 episode "The Turning Point" is the first episode to have a murder not committed by Damon. He is visibly offended when Stefan accuses him of it.
• In The Wire, a warrant is issued for the arrest of Omar. A delivery driver was shot in cold blood, and the only witness fingered him. Omar has a towering reputation for violence among gangsters and police, but a few cops more familiar with his methods are skeptical. Det. McNulty allows him a phone call as he's arrested that probably saves his life, and Det. Bunk Moreland pisses off his colleagues in Homicide trying to get them to investigate deeper. The truth is that the witness lied as part of a frame-up. Since Omar's profession is robbing drug dealers, one of the drug bosses framed him with the intent of getting him shivved in lock-up.
  Det. Moreland: This here is a taxpayer murder with an eyeball witness.
  Omar: The eyeball witness is lying, yo. Come on, now. When have you ever known me to put my gun on anybody that wasn't in the game?
• The X-Files: In the episode "Aubrey", evidence links two violent crimes to a man who served decades for similar crimes. He doesn't pretend to have been rehabilitated in the slightest, instead offering in his defense the fact that he's in his eighties and can't go anywhere without an oxygen tank.
• A comedic version occurs in Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger: The heroes face a Monster of the Week modeled on a director who has the power to scan peoples' minds and then trap them in a movie genre they like. The first two times this happens, he scans Amy and sticks the team in a cop movie and a school delinquents movie; the third time, King tells everyone to clear their minds... but they still end up in a Kaiju movie anyhow.
  King: Ammmmmyyyyy...
  Amy: I didn't do it this time!
  Torin (appearing in Bragigas): I'm sorry everyone, I'm afraid this is my fault.
  King: Torin?!
  Torin: You see, Amy left these DVDs in Spirit Base...
  Utusemimaru: Lady Amy...
  Amy: I'm sorry...