Eischied

- Season 1

(1979)

This two-hour episode, actually Parts 1 and 2 of three (in the NBC reruns, they were shown as two 90-minute episodes; in syndication, they are three one-hour episodes), is a close retelling of the Son of Sam case, with Albert Colvin (James Stephens) as a serial killer who hunts down and shoots beautiful women while taunting reporters by phone. This and other Eischied episodes makes extensive use of location filming in New York, a rarity for television series of the time.

In an episode that's an obvious remake of the Son of Sam case, serial killer Albert Colvin claims his sixth victim, but without using the trademark silencer on his gun. Eischied sees this as a sign that the killer's self-control is slipping and may be a harbinger of his next planned attacks. Through clues given by Colvin to two reporters, Eischied is able to track Colvin to his final planned attack at a Catholic church.

A South American country's diplomats doing business with the United Nations are smuggling drugs in the diplomatic pouch. By international law, their baggage cannot be searched. When one of their hirelings kills an undercover cop during a botched buy in Central Park, Eischied schemes to find a way to get the dealers and their connections out into the open where they can be arrested without the cloak of diplomatic immunity.

Captain Finnerty is charged with negligent homicide for fatally shooting an assailant, a 13-year-old boy.

Captain Finnerty, attacked in a parking garage by a group of teenage punks, manages to get out his service revolver and fire, killing one of the gang. The dead boy, nicknamed "Goody," is only 13 and seemingly unarmed, sparking a firestorm of calls for Finnerty's scalp. To save him, Eischied must track down the group of teenagers and their Fagin-like boss, who have Goody's weapon and are preying on other middle-aged targets.

An overzealous cop puts at risk Eischied's case against a man who lures girls in bringing prostitution.

"The Dancer," an attractive man with scars from tattoos, picks up attractive women in discotheques, drugs them, tattoos them to look ugly, then rapes and murders them. He crossed Eischied's path 15 years earlier, then disappeared -- the reason being he was a participant in a famous diamond heist and absconded with his share of the loot. Now he's back and killing again, and Eischied must persuade the sole survivor of his previous attacks to relive her memories in hopes of getting an active profile of the killer.

Eischied's investigation into a politician's death is hampered by his family, and by the police brass who want to bury the fact that he died while entertaining his mistress.

Know what this is about? Be the first one to add a plot.

A gang of bank robbers is terrorizing the city and Eischied is determined to put an end to their success. He organizes a team of his most elite police officers to apprehend the bandits.

A serial arsonist's latest caper causes the garment factory he's torching to cave in on an adjacent restaurant, killing four people. The torch is working on a contract system, and on his own murders two other people who get in his way and injures a third. Eischied and his detectives arrange for a warehouse to be next on the hit list and lie in wait, leading to a wild gunfight.

Saturday-night-special handguns are flooding the streets of New York City, and a check finds that they are being bought in South Carolina, where (at the time) there were no restrictions on gun sales. Eischied sends an undercover agent to the Palmetto State to look at a group of gun buyers who are buying the guns in bulk and reselling them for profit, but she witnesses the murder of another agent and Eischied must try to rescue her before her cover is blown.

The murder of a police officer may be tied to an underground ring of crooked cops.