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30 September 1984In this Pilot episode we are introduced to Jessica Fletcher, a recent widow, who lives in Cabot Cove, Maine. Jessica is an English teacher who becomes a mystery book author thanks to her nephew, Grady Fletcher. Grady submits his Aunts manuscript to a publishing company who loves it and publishes it immediately. It is a best-seller and Jessica goes to New York City to promote her new book. While there Jessica gets involved in a murder while at her publishers home for a costume party. When her nephew becomes a suspect of the murder, Jessica must find the real killer.
7 October 1984A mysterious man who briefly stops by Jessica's house turns up dead -- supposedly swept overboard during a hurricane before Jessica even met him.
14 October 1984Jessica visits her niece Victoria ''Vicky'' Brandon in San Francisco, who tells her that her fiancé, New York would be-actor Howard Griffin, isn't working in life insurance as he pretended. The ladies go to Mr. Drake's night-club which Vicky found out he's somehow connected to, see he's performing there as drag-queen, and worse: during star Michael Dupont's act Howard runs out in panic after finding Drake's shot corps. Vicky believes in Howard's innocence unconditionally, even accepts his weird job, so Jessica is determined to help initially unappreciative SFPD Detective Lt. Floyd Novack find the real killer. The club proves a viper's nest full of motives both in showbiz, including promising performer Freddy York, who would miss out on a dream contract because held him to a lousy contract and later gets wounded in an intentional 'accident' on stage, and the Drake family's (adulterous) love life. It all hangs on the tiny details only Jessica notices and makes sense of..
28 October 1984When Jessica hears on TV that director-producer Jerry Lydecker is turning the movie after her respectable mystery book The Corps Danced At Midnight into cheap slash junk with sex and gore, she flies to Hollywood to protest, but studio boss Marty Strindberg, who sends her a junior lawyer, and Lydecker have a contract clause she signed waving her rights to object. When Jessica intends to apologize to Lydecker, she finds him killed on he set, and becomes the only obvious suspect. Fortunately LAPD Detective Mack Brody, an amateur mystery writer himself, has enough faith in Jessica to encourage her snooping and believe she saw evidence which disappeared during the minute she talked to the security guard. Lydecker's ruthless behavior and romantic affair with the unexperienced female co-star provide several possible motives...
4 November 1984While Jessica attends a hunting party, someone tampers in the stables with the normally quiet horse of the rich host, Denton Langley, which suddenly goes wild and causes him to have a fatal fall, yet the drug test Jessica suggests is negative. The will on videotape gives his shocked relatives and estate staff peanuts, $15,000,000 goes to Denton's pet hound Teddy, who is shortly after found drugged after biting old local Isaiah Potts. Family lawyer Marcus Boswell, who is constantly called by his broker, is challenged by the human heirs' lawyer on account of the dog's mental competence. Then Trish Langley is found killed by the security gate, the button which operates it from security guard Barnes's closed room has Teddy's paw print on it, he must have been trained to do do. Jessica works out precisely what ties in, how, and what doesn't..
18 November 1984An intruder kills rich old lady Allison Brevard while burglarizing her townhouse. When Jessica goes to a college to give a mystery writing guest lecture, she takes a secretary for the first time, not an older woman as she expected but bright, charming, extremely efficient student David Tolliver. Just when they celebrated ending the work in a restaurant, the police gets David for questioning about Allison's murder, just because he was seen meeting her and accepted gifts and dinners. Jessica grants David the benefit of the doubt and follows up on a call to meet about an alibi for David with young married Lila Schroeder Kowalski, only to see her collapse murdered. David now has an alibi and admits he saw Lila, secretly because of her hunky but violently jealous husband Jack Kowalski, who claims David wasn't the threat to his marriage. Jessica tells dean Edmund Gerard's secretary Amelia she's not interested romantically in her host, who makes a surprising confession after Jessica is attacked in college after asking flirtatious professor Prof. Todd Lowery suspicious questions during her next lecture. Now she sets a trap...
25 November 1984Jessica isn't looking forward to tell Cabot Cove that her historical research for Founder's Day proves the captain was actually a pirate and fought on the British side, against Washington's troops. Businessman Charles Woodley lands in hospital after the surging of a car without driver which seemed to be pursuing local Ethan Cragg. Local inventor Daniel O'Brien, who devised a remote control system for cars before he was fired, denies having agreed to a meeting with his former employer Woodley, shortly after the car under remote control strikes again, killing Woodley's 50% Boston business partner, Dean Merrill. Daniel's heir, Tony Holiday, is back in town to present his bride, Leslie Andler Sheriff Amos Tupper happily 'allows' Jessica to 'observe for her next book', in fact doing the sleuthing with and without Amos, who arrests Daniel just for being most likely to have controlled the killer car....
9 December 1984When Jessica visits her Kansas relatives, police detective Lieutenant Bert Donovan's family, she is invited by theme park magnate Horatio Baldwin and firmly turns down his project for another one based on horror elements from her mystery books. Shirtly after Horatio is found dead in his self-locked office, apparently suicided, but actually got a fatal blow on the head before the shot. After Erica Baldwin becomes a rich widow for the fourth time, she hires Jessica to prove it was murder so the life-insurance can be cleared. Horatio's secretary makes a false confession. Almost everybody had some reason to hate Horatio, who was quite dirty in business in various ways. Jessica soon finds out how the killer got in and out while stealing Horatio's secret files and more, while the murder makes another victim, then she sets a trap...
16 December 1984Invited by Leo Peterson, a former dancer who defected long ago, Jessica attends a Boston performance of the famous Soviet Russian Rostoff ballet. She guesses something is up when Leo gets a program from the bottom of the pile with a code; after the performance they are joined in his car by defecting star dancers Alexander and Natalia Masurov but hear on the radio that KGB security agent Serge Berensky has been found dagger-murdered in their dressing room, so Jessica gives them short-term sanctuary at her home while she snoops. KGB Major Anatole Karzof declares to be a fan of her books and joins her, defending he thesis the defectors did it, while FBI Agents O'Farrell and Dewey Johnson conduct the official investigation. She discovers there is more...
30 December 1984English hypnotist Cagliastro is fired by casino-hotel-owner Joe Kellijian, because he does his glamorous wife Regina. Jessica saves her editor's assistant Joan Germaine's bacon covering for making a date for her with Cagliostro as inspiration for another mystery book. They overhear the master dare local press journalists Bud Michaels and rookie Andy Townsend to be hypnotized before a revealing interviewer so they won't remember a word unless he's a charlatan as they claim, Joan gets them invited too but they're late; when the door is opened after a scary bang, Cagliostro lies dead, the six journalists (Bud sent Andy in his place) are hypnotized motionless. Fortunately for the startled police detective Lt. Bergkamp, Jessica is as resourceful and inspired as ever after Dr. Yambert proves hypnosis works even on her, but nobody seems to have both motive and opportunity...
6 January 1985US Congressman Wendell Joyner gets a fatal heart-attack at 's party, arranged by Congressman Dan Keppner and dodgy lobbyist Harry Parmel, actually at a party for a potential successor, officially in his bed. The governor of Maine demands Jessica to fill in as federal legislator for a few weeks till the party can officially select a new Congressman. She keeps on Joyner's staff for her short tenure, notably helpful driver-press agent Joe Blinn and administrative assistant Diana Simms. Detective Lieutenant Avery Mendelsohn tails Jessica and explains he suspects Joyner to be murdered after finding out his corpse was moved. She decides to help him sleuthing on and around Capitol Hill, including dirty lobbying, after suspiciously well-housed nobody Martha Craig is found murdered and recovering alcoholic Keppner was drugged and robbed on the street, believing he was framed clumsily and discovering if it all ties in to a legislature vote on a cannery in Maine...
13 January 1985Grady Fletcher invites aunt Jessica to be his guest at a Broadway show he's doing the bookkeeping for and meet both his girl-friend and has-been movie star Rita Bristol, whose prima donna-attitude and drinking endanger the show that was to be her come-back and the launch of daughter Patti Bristol. They all dine with others including son Barry Bristol, director Marc Faber and banker Si Parrish, the principal investor. On the way home, Pati is shot in the spine by street mugger Manny Farkus, who gets a fatal bullet from Barry. To reluctant Barry's surprise, the show isn't canceled but LA star Lonnie Valerian takes recovering Pati's part. NYPD Detective Sergeant Moreno didn't feel like investigating further, but Jessica does dig into past and present of the Bristol family, the show people, the mugger who she recognizes as unemployed actor Morley Farmer and some New York street witnesses.
3 February 1985Jessica is invited to New Orleans by TV station WDX, but arrives two days early by mistake, so her host Jonathan Hawley has 48 hours to show her the 'Cajun paradise' (French quarter). Jessica soon notices the jazz show circuit can be nastily competitive; then clarinetist Ben Coleman dies from an apparent heart-attack during a recording, as she presumed actually curare-poisoning, but why and how exactly? NOPD Detective Lt. Simeon Kershaw gets help from Jessica investigating Ben's private, artistic and business context, even smuggling...
10 February 1985When Jessica's recently widowed friend takes a cruise to get away from it all, a would-be murderer follows her.
17 February 1985Famous painter Diego Santana celebrates his sixtieth anniversary on his Mediterranean island retreat with his second wife, ex, son Miguel, daughter, protégé and a few friends. He is nearly killed by a massive flower pot thrown down by a left-handed shadow, and asks Jessica, who arrives the next morning by helicopter with gallery keeper Sir John Landry, to investigate in secret, helped by first batch guest police inspector Henry Kyle, but Diego is soon killed on a walk with his own crossbow, the weapon son Miguel excels at, who took another guest, art collector in financial trouble Willard Kaufmann, to the mainland after a heart attack. Then arson destroys Diego's latest paintings, who were tripled in value by his death...
24 February 1985While highly respected P.I. Archie Miles, who even teaches at the police academy, is working on the old Danbury scalpel murder case, involving judge Lambert, for Jessica's research, he is shot in his office. His rather shady, clumsier partner Harry McGraw contacts Jessica as Archie was working on only two other cases, about allegedly adulterous contractor Ernie Santini and editor Priscilla Daniels of Femininity Magazine, who suddenly backs down on her political ambitions. Detective Lieutenant Starkey confides into Jessica the police wouldn't mourn Harry getting rid of Archie's killer, anyhow, she snoops herself, then teams up with Harry...
3 March 1985Jessica inherits from uncle Cyrus a holding company, the only asset being the crucial 4% in the Leopards professional American football team which two groups control at 48% each, and executive lawyer Brad Lockwood fails to make her sign proxy powers for it before she checks it out herself. She meets player Zak Farrell, his wife Kathy and adopted mute daughter Jill. Businessman Phil Kreuger is dead-eager to buy Jessica out for one share-holders group and move the franchise to a bigger city, coach Pat Patillo bids against him for the other group which wants to keep the team home. After a party with nearly everyone, Krueger is found drowned in the club's stadium, Zak arrested as he was seen storming in and out around the time of the murder, Jessica rather then police Lt. Clyde Pitts finds out -at peril- who else had motive and opportunity till she can set a trap...
10 March 1985Jessica sets out to clear the name of a friend who is a prime suspect in a murder case.
17 March 1985On the bus back from a convention in Boston, Jessica, Amos Tupper and a slew of passengers are forced to take refuge from a fierce storm at a remote diner where one of the passengers is discovered murdered in his seat, stabbed.
31 March 1985While in the hospital with a fractured leg, Jessica investigates the murder of a fellow patient.
7 April 1985An unpopular comic's life is threatened, but guess who turns up dead?
21 April 1985Jessica has to unravel the secrets and threats at the funeral of a friend in Wyoming.
29 September 1985Jessica's friend has been murdered, so Jessica masquerades as a wealthy widow at a luxurious tropical hotel in an effort to trap the murderer.
6 October 1985A cheap tycoon with many enemies is found dead on the construction site of his high-rise hotel.
13 October 1985Jessica's niece, an actress in a daytime drama, becomes a suspect when the head writer for the show is murdered.
25 October 1985Jessica arrives at Grenshaw to hold the commencement speech and receive an honorary degree at the local college. The preceding faculty party is animated by host Dr. Jocelyn Laird's daughter Daphne Clover, who jumps into the pool naked and her beefy, drunk New York lover Nick Fulton who knocks down Professor Ron Mercer and a vase with one punch, still shirtless. Next morning Jessica finds Nick's corps under a construction site as if he fell to his death, but that must be staged as he has no dust on his shoes. Local Police Chief E. Griffin, who knows Jessica from criminology studies, arrests Daphne after an anonymous phone call leads to finding a typed blackmail note from Nick and a bloody candle stick in her room, but Jessica convinces him it may well be all planted. She checks on other party-goers' links with Nick and each-other, leading to two contradictory confessions, neither of which she believes...
27 October 1985Jessica's redheaded British cousin Emma McGill has her fly over to London to attend her 'funeral' as requested by last will, but actually it's a staged car accident so they can sleuth who is behind three incidents Emma considers but can't prove to be murder attempts, in her view for ownership of her old-fashioned Mayhew music hall, which is in financial trouble but valuable if sold -would be-buyers even awaited Jessica at the airport-, half of the profits would go to her late co-founder's wimpy son Archie Weems and his greedy spouse Violet. Jessica turns to a Scotland Yard friend but as he is on holiday confides in his colleague Inspector Roger Crimmins, who plays along so the suspects can be examined. While they approach Emma's London apartment, Mayhem dresser Bridget O'Hara leaves it and is fatally struck by a fast car, possibly because she was dressed like Emma in a coat promised to her; Emma admits she left a reassuring message to her old friend, has-been Shakespearian actor Oliver Trumbull, father of Mayhew actress Kitty, who is arrested for lying about hearing the answering machine message, but...
3 November 1985Scott Lodge thinks his wife Francesca is going crazy and trying to kill him. But when a phone call from her supposedly dead first husband precedes the fatal incident, Jessica must unravel fact from hysteria to find a killer.
10 November 1985Jessica's fellow guests at a remote inn include an obsessive birdwatcher, an enthusiastic nature lover who likes to streak through the woods, a rich jerk and his shy wife, and a devoted fisherman whose wife doesn't sit home waiting for him. When Jessica sees one guest push another into the lake, she's determined to understand what happened and why.
Season 2, Episode 8: Dead Heat
24 November 1985Under instructions from big boss Tony, local mobster boss Vince Shackman leans heavily on race horse trainer Mike Gann to settle his gambling debts by fixing a race, which takes quite a lot, including making a Panamese illegal jockey be replaced 'sick' by greenhorn Tracy Macgill, a niece of Jessica, who made a stop-over on the way to San Francisco to see her debut. When Tracey is arrested for the tranquilizer gun murder of Jack Bowen, Jessica fears the police won't solve the case and takes crash courses in betting and running a stable while investigating everybody involved, including unethical betting by the track security chief...
1 December 1985During Jessica's lecture in a woman's prison with an all-female staff, the doctor is found, killed by a morphine injection, with convict Mary's fingerprints on, but this is proven not to be the murder weapon. Next there is a revolt, which takes Jessica hostage but is ill-prepared: even the demands are a matter for debate. Jessica is now asked to investigate, and while she digs into malpractices apparently involving warden Gates, who has political ambition, and conflicts involving staff as well as prisoners, another staff member is killed. Jessica discovers things are not as they appear.
15 December 1985Amos eagerly retires, handing over his sheriff's star to real estate agent Harry Pierce, but then Beverly Gareth is found electrocuted in her bath. She was the heir to land of vital importance to Friedrich Hoffman's environmentally horrible 400 condos Cabot Cove coast development project. The town is flooded by gossip letters badmouthing -at least part are lies- Beverly, only one of which was sent by Elvira Tree, who is next found hung. Jessica, her guest New York travel reporter Michael Digby and Amos discover both women were murdered, how, by whom and why; meanwhile the new sheriff Pierce arrests repairman Larry Burns, who allegedly didn't fix Beverly's fatally ragged electric cord after an accusation from Adam Frobisher, then him and Hoffman, but Jessica does her own sleuthing...
29 December 1985Jessica visits Dr. Seth Hazlitt at the New Mexico archaeological dig paid by Gideon Armstrong, led by Southwest University professor Dr. Stan Garfield, on the site of an Anasazi village, and perhaps Coronado's legendary city of gold, to which story TV celebrity Dr. Aubrey Benton holds the rights. Every evening an Indian ghost costume wearer sings on a cliff, till Armstrong's guards climb up scare him off, but on Jessica's second night Gideon's young wife Cynthia shoots at him and local Navajo Indian guide Raymond Two Crows -already found suspiciously uninformed about Pre-Columbian civilizations- falls to his death, although not hit by her bullet. After Jessica digs up a golden prayer stick, Seth finds Raymond actually died earlier of drowning. More gold is found, Gideon is determined to keep the news from spreading, according to his wife so he can buy the land first. Raymond's belongings inspire Jessica to unmasks several scammers.
5 January 1986Jessica's nephew Grady is applying for a job with the Lila Lee Cosmetics empire. Lila's brother and partner Norman tries to soothe wounded feelings as Lila Lee tyrannizes their employees. Jessica is delighted to see former student Elizabeth Gordon, Norman's intended fiancée. When she's murdered, Jessica finds the killer.
12 January 1986After Mark Lee Reynolds's wife Stephanie has a car accident which at best leaves her cripple for life while he is wounded at the left shoulder, criminal John Detweiler who sees him picking up a woman in a bar where he tries to drink some courage calls her jealous husband, goon Cliff Anderson, who knows his Becky is serially unfaithful. Jessica is foreperson of the jury which must decide if Mark committed murder or only killed in self-defense. She makes everyone go over the crucial witness and expert testimonies during the trial and slowly makes them shift focus from prejudices to evidence and logical deduction concerning premeditation, motive and material facts, pondering both theories, till she comes up with a crucial twist.
19 January 1986Bo Dixon is getting desperate as all his diner customers, even sheriff Tupper and his former waitress Cornelia, desert to the Joshua Peabody Inn on the Interstate. When he checks out the competition during breakfast and sees the owner Floyd Nelson row with the pseudo-French chef Alan Dupree, who wanted out of his three year contract by getting fired, there is a mild case of food poisoning and a fatal one: businessman Harrison Fraser III's wife Wilhelmina's best friend Betty Fiddler. While Dr. Seth Hazlitt calls in haughty health inspector Margo Perry and concludes on atropine, Jessica looks into the possibility of murder. The only missing item is a jar of old Mrs. Margo Perry's strawberry preserves, which Amos is allergic to. Jessica unmasks Dupree as a fake cordon bleu and Harrison as Betty Fiddler's adulterous lover, but also doubts the intended victim and ties up more minute observations...
Season 2, Episode 15: Powder Keg
9 February 1986When her friend Professor Ames Caulfield takes Jessica along to recover in the country after a literary conference, his car breaks down in southern Roper County, they'll have to stay a few days in the inn of Cassie Latham Burns, to his amazement a former student of his, whose charming adolescent son Matthew performs Country in Frank Kelso's saloon. Ames witnesses how the kid is publicly humiliated by slutty waitress Linda Bonner's brother Ed and his goons, including service station employees Andy Crane and Billy Willetts, all storm out furious and shouting threats. After Ed is found dead with stab wounds behind the rectory, his dad farmer Bonner uses his considerable clout to weigh on Sheriff Claudell Cox, who assures Jessica Matt is safest in jail, while after pulling a knife on Kelso the lynching-minded rabble assembles outside till Bonner breaks them up; the sheriff admits taking the bloody knife all the way to his home across town where it was found without dumping it in the river makes no sense. Jessica also guesses Cassie's and another secret.
16 February 1986In Oklahoma, Electrical Cathedral TV preacher Willie John Fargo gets Jessica's philanthropist friend Carrie McKittrick to leave his church most of her family's oil fortune by last will. After a heart-attack provoked by her stepson Harvey McKittrick and his son Sam McKittrick's opposition to the will, Carrie dies in the Cathedral's hospital, from cyanide poisoning. Now the heirs produce a deathbed will leaving everything to the family again, which Jessica proves to be posthumously 'signed' by Sam holding her hand. Examining the trails of the fatal syringe in the hospital and the money in the virtual church, Jessica finds Fargo is a diabetic refusing to disclose his alibi; his prints are on the syringe, but...
23 February 1986Celebrity Richard Bennett gets Jessica to bid for him in San Francisco on suicided fellow star friend Evangeline's diary to destroy it. Before the auction she witnesses security guard Albert Cromwell reporting to auctioneer William Readford a failed offer of $5,000 to steal it for Evangeline's therapist Dr. Sylvia Dunn. At the auction, Richard's corpse is found in an armoire. SFPD Lt. Casey nearly arrests Jessica, speculating his check was made out in her name, but still doesn't do after Readford is found murdered too just when Jessica comes return to him the diary she found in the secret compartment of a chess set she privately bought from him. Dodgy P.I. Harland 'Harry' McGraw takes it on himself to 'offer for sale' a photocopy of the diary. Meanwhile Jessica follows up on people mentioned in the diary, finds out who had it auctioned and...
9 March 1986Cabot Cove financial adviser Henry Burning is scheduled to be cremated suspiciously quickly after dying on vacation in Fransdale with his wife and sole beneficiary Connie Vernon, who claims it was a heart-attack but is accused during the church service of killing him by his mistress Phyllis Walters; when the closed casket gets knocked over, it contains another man's corpse. Amos wants to solve this case himself, while Jessica has a manuscript deadline, and gets on great with the widow. Phyllis implores Jessica to find her lover's killer, claiming Henry was ready to leave Connie for her, and tells undertaker Silas Pike she's not romantically interested in him. Clients start asking their investment back from Henry's partner Ned Olson, who fails to find new takers and disapproves of his daughter Christy's relationship with idealist student Stew Bennett. Then Phyllis finds Henry's corpse in her place, but he dies two days after his 'funeral', Connie claims John Doe is a hitchhiker who happened to die from a heart-attack so they staged Henry's death to collect his life insurance. Olson announces the Pheasant Ridge investment fund's $1,000,000 capital was entirely withdrawn by Henry and is missing. Jessica looks very inspired when Stew reports his van stolen, things speed up and she sets a trap...
30 March 1986Jessica is unhappy her nephew accountant Grady Fletcher's new employer is the publisher Christopher Bundy, who just purchased the magazine Literary Lines which is to run one of her stories and transformed it from classy content to 'centerfold' thrash. When they visit him in the villa where he lives with his sister Rachel and her son Tony and daughter Vanessa from different marriages, Bundy convinces her to stay the night and meet with his lawyers and assures her the security cameras record only images, no sound, and not in bedrooms. Jessica convinces the magazine's broke original publisher Chester Harrison, kept on as figurehead, to put on a fight for its respectability. Then Bundy is shot dead inside, in a camera-dead angle. Detective Lt. Greco just suspects Chester, Jessica and Grady at first the butler but he's really undercover after Bundy's criminal family, then dig deeper. The sister inherits the empire and proves a shark herself, with Vanessa as right-hand. Then Jessica sees trough the killer's alibi.
6 April 1986Jessica is the guest of honor opening the children's fund benefit exhibition tournament in Elliot Robinson's Green River Rocquet tennis club, where her young friend Carol McDermott has a managing position. Brian East, Carol's charming fiancé who dumped haughty fellow tennis player Cissy Barnes for her, is killed by a dynamite explosion in the car he borrowed from Carol. Investigating detective lieutenant Tad Travis is a fan of Jessica, but is killed by knife when he visits Carol at home; she claims the killer is her beloved sister Barbara, an alcoholic who was buried three years ago after a plane-crash, however her grave is untended and Carol was in a psychiatric institution at the time, which Travis had already discovered. Then Barbara turns up alive, admitting she switched identity with a dead passenger. Jesscii snoops on among the tennis people...
13 April 1986Jessica goes to New Orleans during the Mardi Gras festival to check on cousin-in-law Calhoun 'Cal' Fletcher as promised to old aunt Mildred. As her hotel was only booked from the next night, she goes straight to Cal's place, but the only man in the Cyrano de Bergerac costume she was told he wears ignores her and storms with drawn sword into a room besides the party hall from where a fight is heard, which leaves a real corpse, Johnny Blaze, with Cal written in blood besides him. NOPD Lt. Edmund Cavette concludes from her eye for murder scene details who Jessica is and explains the Lafitte mansion which Cal inherited is no home but a gambling place. Cavette arrests at his humbler home Cal, who claims he didn't even know what happened there, Cavette knows he was indebted to Blaze, now Cal admits he recently accused Blaze of cheating. Fellow gambler attorney Mitch Payne promises bail tomorrow and considers pleading self-defense; he got Blaze off a murder over cards he probably committed- on Cavette's own son Eric. Jessica untangles more sordid intrigues concerning such matters as Congressman Brad Gardner's IOU's which his rich wife Rosaline tried to buy back, Cal's fiancée Kitty Manette's infidelity, before trapping the killer at a reconstruction...
18 May 1986Just when Jessica visits her Cedar Heighs senior friend Lloyd Marcus, who insists to show her a manuscript 'from a friend' to read and comment on, the mysterious local art thief strikes again, right there on houseman Forbes's day off, as he does every few months without any witnesses. Next day they find his daughter Julia is robbed in her home, but also killed. Jessica, rather then police chief Cooper, who retired from the NYPD, investigates, examining the crime scenes, neighbors, friends, other art owners...
28 September 1986Favorite aunt Jessica arrives three days before the society wedding of Carol Bannister, who is convinced the silver leprechaun she receives among the wedding gifts is from her grandfather, Jessica's late husband Frank's brother Neil Fletcher, who is presumed dead. When the antiques salesman sort of recognizes his picture as the out of town buyer, Jessica guesses right he may be among Edgar Carmody's family circus which was in town then, and goes snooping there. She in on Neil's rail, as he works there as roustabout under the name Carl Schulman, as Edgar knows. Neil/Carl ran but is arrested after unpopular Hank Sutter, who harassed fellow artist Katie McCallum and bullied her teenage son Charlie, is found dead near, however not trampled by elephants, as none has a blood-stained foot, but beaten to death, like with Charlie's beloved baseball bat which Hank took from the boy. Neil explains why he staged his own death to escape his loveless marriage. Jessica is determined to prove her brother-in-law's innocence, investigating the other circus people, despite the almighty mayor Powers, who overrules the cripple, weak sheriff Lynn Childs, but then Neil confesses and indicates where the murder weapon is...
5 October 1986Only when Jessica tells Neil, who is cancer-terminal and inflicted himself a nasty wound, that Charlie's bat was taken away by bully Hank before his murder, he admits he only took the blame to protect the kid before running after finding the bloody bat behind the corpse. Roustabout Brad Kaneally swears his hands are always roughed up, from work. Then there is another staged near-accident and Harry Kingman is found strangled in an inn while Neil is still in jail on the mayor's orders, sheriff Lynn Childs decides to brave him and help Jessica, who makes Brad tell her that he is a former boxer and alcoholic on the run after a fatal fist fight in a bar and protected the McCallums against Hank, leaving him unconscious on the murder night, only the killer hit below the neck. Next Jessica finds Maylene Sutter knocked down and is drugged while her cart is torched where Jessica was lured by a note, but they are found in time. She now accuses and enforces a confession from...
12 October 1986When lieutenant detective Barney Kale is offered a trip around the world at his third and final retirement, he announces to delay it till Spring to finish full-time what he considers his only unsolved murder case, his friend Lowel Dixon's drowning ten years ago at Juniper Lake in the midst of a property development scandal. Local motel proprietor Jake Sanford informs everyone who was into it, including Seth Hazlit. Worying doc may get in trouble, Jessica and Amos go looking, and find ex-con Gary Roberts shot in Kale's cabin, the cop claims his accident at the lake dock was doctored. They stay to help sheriff McCoy and Kale investigate the new and old murders, if linked to each-other -which she proves unlikely- and of course the other guests, including Gary's young widow Maggie Roberts whom he promised a fortune after this trip, Seth's period friend Cynthia Tate and her present friend Dr. Terence Mayhew. Finding Gary's killed cell-mate's phone-number makes Jessica wonder...
19 October 1986Another convoluted Michael Hagarty story, this one featuring hidden pasts, a secret society, and a murdered Embassy employee found clutching a white rose.
2 November 1986Visiting her niece Victoria Brandon Griffin, Jessica finds her crumbled by her job in advertising to give husband Howard financial comfort to pursue his acting career, while he feels guilty for being a kept man. However Vicky gets arrested after finding her mean boss, Larry Kinkaid, skull smashed with an award her fingerprints are on, just after she resigned refusing to court a married client. Jessica forces NYPD lieutenant Spoletti to look further, notably the security guard's list of building visitors, including an obvious alias she traces to Christine Clifford, the man-eater from an agency which competed with Kinkaid for the Corned Beef Castle account, and the delivery of a sandwich. Furthermore she looks into the agency's office politics, notably Larry's older brother and heir Myron Kinkaid and senior account manager Aubrey Thornton, whose position was most precarious...
9 November 1986Retired Navy Dr. Wylie Graham takes a yacht in Cabot Cove near his friend Seth while working in the nearest hospital. Ladiesman David Everett, a former flame of Jessica, is in town to have an 18th century treasure ship found by four young people who entered a tontine: the survivors inherit any deceased member's share. Just after they locate the ship, diver Bill Ainsley had a nearly fatal accident, probably equipment sabotage. Next Alexandra Bell, drunk from the celebratory champagne at Jessica's, is run over after twen partner Coby Russell dropped her off with money for a cab and a phone call; he's arrested, Jessica snoops on- 'Alex' actually died from a blow on the head before the hit. David is a plausible suspect for both acts, and deep in debt with loan-shark Ross Barber and his goon Gregory Small. When Ross Barber bails out, fearing for his safety, Jessica realizes he was the silent investor too and puts up a $10,000 loan. Then a key inspires her a chilling alternative scenario.
16 November 1986Respactable old-fashioned reporter Haskell Drake lands in hospital with a fit after his attack for sensationalist copy-doctoring at tycoon Lamar Bennett, who recently bought the Boston Daily Sentinel from equally conservative Walter Revere, gets him fired on the spot. Jessica tries to reason with Bennett on her old friend Drake's behalf but is told to come back at a celebratory drink in a hotel, where she witnesses Bennet getting a fatal brain hemorrhage while announcing Walter is fired too, which Jessica realizes can be induced by a combination of alcohol and pills, not necessarily taken simultaneously, while Bennet was on sinusitis medication, as she explained to grumpy BPD lieutenant A. Caruso, who concurs from the autopsy it was methaltionide and rather sees her as a suspect because of a rather defamatory recent article on her. When Jessica accepts to 'do some legwork' for an article Haskel plans on Lamar's sordid career she finds the Revere family, which hopes in vain to buy back control of the newspaper, touchy about that subject. Haskel discovers Lamar probably has an illegitimate child, possibly Walter's son Perry's fiancée and newspaper colleague Kay Garrett. Jessica thinks that trough plus an anomaly in Lamar's death's reporting.
23 November 1986In Part 2 of a crossover story with "Magnum, P.I." (both episodes are shown on the "Murder" DVD, although not consecutively), Magnum has shot it out with a hired gunman at a party, killing him. Magnum claims the thug had fired several shots at him, including one just before Magnum returned fire. But the police can't find the gunman's weapon, and furthermore he was shot in the back. An overzealous police captain calls it murder one (huh?) and throws Magnum into the cooler pending trial. Jessica searches the crime scene and finds a shell casing which doesn't match Magnum's gun, fitting Magnum's theory. A horrified Higgins realizes that a gun similar to Magnum's -- and with a silencer, at that -- stolen from Robin Masters' collection could well be the murder weapon. The police captain won't give up, and puts out a fugitive warrant on Magnum when a second murder occurs in the same fashion as the first.
7 December 1986When an obnoxious out-of-town TV personality is murdered, it's up to Jessica to figure out the killer.
14 December 1986Jessica visits a rural revival of a play she was in with her late husband Frank and present stars Julian Lord and Maggie Tarrow. On opening night, something scares Maggie out of performing, and her understudy Barbara Bennington is killed by cyanide poisoning of her red wine on stage. Local chief of police Merton P. Drock, who plays the butler, never solved a real murder, but trusts Jessica will provide him with the 'script', yet keeps on making precipitous conclusions and accusations as the links appear with the breaking off of the productions 30 years ago, when Maggie took a year off by ruse, as now appears to give birth in secret, plausibly to fake reporter T.J. Holt. Julian prevents a second cyanide killing which would murder Maggie. Who knew and resented what exactly?
4 January 1987Only after arrival at Wenton, Vermont Jessica learns she was asked by her orphaned literary protégé Dorian Beecher, who succeeded as boys boarding school poetry teacher to the car accident-drowned daughter of local dentist Penn 'Doc' Walker, to play Dorian's 'mother' to impress his employer, Wenton Academy's pedigree-obsessed owner Edwin Dupont, whose daughter Sarah he loves, rivaled only by the studly riding instructor Nate Findley, an obnoxious womanizer who even did headmistress Charlotte Newcastle. Walking home after an embarrassing saber fight in a pub with Nate, Dorian is run down by the disguised headless horseman he always assumes to be Nate, on his black stallion Gunshot. Sheriff Rankin jails liar Dorian after Nate's decapitated corpse is found nearby, clumsily redressed as the horseman. Jessica sifts two plots from secrets and motives, involving an anonymous school funds embezzlement note, the secret society of mischievous schoolboys Todd Carrier, Robert and Brendan and a past crime...
18 January 1987While on a flight to London, a wealthy woman's chauffeur dies suddenly, and when the priceless necklace he was carrying turns up missing, it becomes a case of murder.
Season 3, Episode 13: Crossed Up
1 February 1987Grady nurses Jessica who must stay in bed with her bad back for weeks, bored to death. During a hurricane she overhears a crossed-up call from a raspy male voice about selling a Cabot Cove estate and killing an old male relative. Seth, Grady and Amos think she imagines the hired gun, but indeed that night widowed lumber millionaire Jedediah Rogers is found shot in his lavish estate where he lived alone with his sons Adam, Gordon and Morgan, who wanted him to leave the business and have no alibis, and orphaned granddaughter Leslie Cameron who was about to be made the sole heir instead. While Amos believes it's a mere burglary, Jessica joins the investigation by remote control Grady. Soon after once fired employee Abel Gorcey dies in a suspicious accident, a potential hired gun, and more danger lurks...
8 February 1987College music student Michael 'Mike' Prentice discovers that his professor Tyler Stoneham published a song based on a theme part of one of his assignments as his own composition, under the alias Alden Gilbert, but can't prove the plagiarist theft. The professor's wife Christine Stoneham also suspects him of adultery with a student. Professor Harry Papasian, Stoneham's assistant, is furious not to be mentioned as co-author on their new music dictionary. Stoneham is found stabbed to death in the archives where Mike was looking for the original partitions, enough for an arrest. His friend, law student Chad Singer, starts sleuthing, helped by fellow music student who helps trace more musical malversations to Broadway. Christine actually has a secret affair herself with Vice Chancellor Simon. Musical producer Max Hellinger promises Papazian $5,000 to help find some Gilbert songs, Chad finds out. After the lyrics writer is traced, Chad stages an elaborate reconstruction to trick the killer...
15 February 1987Jessica visits Denver for a TV book review program at KBLR, where her friend Dr. Jayne's husband Steve Honig produces arrogant Kenneth Chambers's program The Bottom Line, which exposes faulty products, or when he has his way picks his victim and even doctors the story unethically, while grossly abusing all staff. Janitor Bert Tanaka finds Chambers shot twice in his office chair shortly after he unjustly fired production assistant Ryan Monroe. DPD Lieutenant Lou Flannigan, who was Chambers's unofficial police consultant, lets Jessica 'observe'. The murder weapon is found in Steve's car. Jessica considers motives from ambition among station staff, as many get a better job and Kenneth was considering to leave everyone behind for a bigger one, and toy producer Joe Rinaldi, against whom Kenneth prepared a show, the tapes of which seem missing but are found in his safe with cash and other 'evidence' he used to extort Rinaldi and others potential show targets, but is puzzled by Chambers's chair facing the broken TV set and the cleaning, leading her to guess a major twist and set a trap...
22 February 1987Jessica visits her old friend Harry McGraw (Orbach) in New York who has become wrangled in the high stakes game of boxing.
1 March 1987Irene Rutledge can't afford a bike for her son Tommy, and Jessica lets him earn her husband's old bike by working in her garden. Artist Simon Thane says he has been working on a special canvas all summer, but hasn't let anyone see it. When Simon is found dead and the mysterious painting has disappeared, Amos arrests Irene for murder. But Jessica is convinced that Irene is innocent.
15 March 1987Mack Howard and Murray Gruen were a celebrated comical duo but party in anger. Murray's daughter Corey brings their friend Jessica along to his own Hiawatha lodge for her and Mack's son Kip Howard's engagement dinner. Murray however makes a scene, claiming Mack stole a fortune in royalties on videos of the duo, denied by Mack and his agent who claims there is no profit. Then Murray is stabbed in the back and suggests he only saw a color, that of Mack's robe. Later Murray's agent Phil Rinker is found hanging in the store-room, suicide according to a note apparently in his hand-writing. The sheriff being sick, his only deputy, local youngster Wylie B. Ledbetter, now proud Acting Police Chief, is delighted as a mystery fan to have Jessica coach his forensics and interviews, but startled when she proves by measurements it must have been a murder, staged as suicide. Jessica next concludes from a peephole the stabbing was a separate mischief, then proves it by setting a trap for Phil's killer...
22 March 1987In an episode filmed in New York (mostly in a claustrophobic office building, although there are some exterior shots), Grady has landed work at an accounting firm where the owners are suspected of "cooking the books." Grady becomes the prime suspect when one of the partners is murdered, but Jessica discovers that a "phantom" rumored to haunt the office building is a real person, a homeless man who lives in the vents and air ducts, swipes food off desks, and may be a witness to the murder.
5 April 1987Jessica visits C., an Idaho town, to comfort Linda says her husband, mayor Jim Stevens, just died in a car accident, or did he? His hot-headed pa Harry Stevens is dead-set to prove his death was the work of the corrupt sheriff Orville Yates and his hard-handed deputy Wayne Beeler, who are in cahoots with Kate Gunnerson's illegal gambling. Shortly after they go trough Jim's effects Harry storms out after seeing a ciphered reference, but is killed and left by the road, plundered even to his boots. State police captain Ernest Lenko confirms his raids and corruption investigations always failed because legal procedure forces him to inform the sheriff's office. Jessica thinks trough everything, especially relating to Jim's effects, and after being run off the road while accepting a ride from councilman David Carroll, probably intentionally not killed, just badly bruised, Yates's respectable opponent in the spring mayoral election, sets a trap...
19 April 1987When Jessica is pampered in the luxury suite of a hotel, she's approached shyly by restaurant employee Georgia Wilson, whose husband, accountant Sam, was recently released after 30 years jail, assuring he was framed for the shooting of his boss Richard Jarvis, who actually offered Sam his last $10,000 for help when his firm went bust, to make his suicide look like armed robbery so the insurance would pay the Jarvis family a fortune, only someone else really killed him. Their son Rob Wilson became a cop hoping to help his father, now puts all his experience at her disposal. While she, Rob and the now retired police Lt. Webb re-examine the forensics as well as the means, opportunities and motives of surviving members of both families, someone in the know shoots at Jessica with a matching bullet, but must have missed willingly. At least she puzzles the pieces of both shootings together and traps the perpetrators, but...
10 May 1987Jessica is recording one of her murder stories on a tape for the blind in the Red River Studios at night, when director Randy Witworth allows it as a favor to producer Greg Dalton, whom he blinded in a car accident. During one of a recent series of mysterious power cuts interrupting recording sessions, Randy is fatally stabbed in the back with a steak-knife from the Dalton kitchen. Police lieutenant Faraday considers mystery writing a harmless hobby for useless women, real sleuthing man's work, Jessica's attention for a spilled bottle of expensive nail-polish just too much. Still she manages to follow and inspire the investigation, convinced Greg was framed. Randy was worrying about bootleg tapes risking to nullify his rising star Stoney Carmichael's contract, wondering if recording technicians Al Parker and/or Earl Tuchman were accomplices. His widow Margaret is hardly grieving, but already doing business with Carl Anglin, who immediately pulls the plug on the mystery tapes...
20 September 1987Jessica jaunts to Paris at the beckon of an old friend whose fashion boutique is in financial trouble. When a local loan shark is found murdered, Jessica must dig deep to ensure her friend is not fingered as the murderer.
27 September 1987When a strange man arrives at Jessica's door in Cabot Cove, he brings with him a decade-long grudge and thirst for revenge at having been wrongfully convicted of a murder he did not commit 20 years earlier. Coming up against former students and colleagues from her days as a high school English teacher, Jessica is forced to examine the concept of justice.
4 October 1987Jessica obeys a Canadian court summoning to Quebec to give testimony in wealthy fledgling author friend Jim Harlan's trial concerning the death of his young wife Patricia in their country house's fire in his alleged absence. Nationally reputed Attorney Oliver Quayle refuses to acknowledge arson as murder mode; instead he fights the evidence, claiming it could be an accident, despite convincing indications she was even killed by a blow on the head before the fire. The couple was heard to fight over a nasty divorce. Jessica can't resist to do her own investigation, even questioning witnesses like the ex-con plumber, and snooping in the motel where Jim would have an alibi, staying with mistress Monica Blane, who seems to have disappeared. Instead of appreciating her help, the haughty lawyer starts discrediting her in court, referring to a allegedly stolen book plot, psychiatric history and even arrested relatives, none of which was ever convicted. Yet Jessica keeps sleuthing, unearths how Jim -who hurt his cause by silence- eloped with the ex-con showgirl and blackmail was paid by socialite, overbearing mother Judith Harlan, and gets help from Quayle's assistant Barnaby checking on the identification of the corps and dealing with P.I. Rudy Plansky, and a missing broach...
11 October 1987Jessica visits a convent to see a former sorority sister and winds up searching for a nun's killer.
25 October 1987A tyrant's demise puts Jessica on the trail of several of his betrayed executives.
1 November 1987Jessica's British cousin, Emma MacGill (played by Angela Lansbury), is charged with an old flame's murder.
8 November 1987A handyman who has been paying attention to more than the houses of various Cabot Cove ladies needs Jessica's help when he becomes the prime suspect in a murder.
15 November 1987A bomb kills a TV producer who stole a plot from one of Jessica's books.
22 November 1987To look into a small-town murder, Jessica poses as the sister of the slain woman.
29 November 1987A Native Indian lays claim to Cabot Cove, throwing the town in chaos. When a local industrialist is found murdered, all signs point to the town's supposed new land owner.
13 December 1987Jessica and her nephew get more than they expected while staying at a posh New York hotel managed by Grady's old fraternity buddy.
3 January 1988When Amos' sister & her in-laws descend upon Cabot Cove, Jessica hosts a dinner party with homicidal results, leaving the finger pointing at the Sheriff's sister.
24 January 1988Jessica visits her niece Carrie Palmer's husband Leonard Palmer, who actually forgot his own anniversary date, being an obsessively comets-devoted astronomy researcher at the Astro-Physics Institute where director Russell Armstrong and high-profile, high-maintenance careerist scientist Dr. Thor Lundquist insist they attend the reception they hold to land a Defense contract Leonard disapproves of. That night Leonard is seen rushing out without signing out or closing up his computer-programmed telescope, which is manually pointed at a 30 miles away vacation house owned by Armstrong, focused at the corps in it of Drake Eaton, the shot 'close employee' of influential arms press diva Madeline DeHaven. The house was lend to Leonard's daughter Carrie Palmer, who admits she had an affair with Drake. Jessica accepts to ghostwrite a book for investigating police sergeant Kettler to get access to all data, while Leonard is fired to avoid image damage. Conflicting statements from Leonard and Carrie make them the obvious suspects, yet Jessica suddenly concentrates on the programming of the telescope.
7 February 1988Jessica convinces Seth to visit his estranged brother. When the brother is found murdered, the pair must try to figure out if a cursed ruby from India is responsible or whether a more sinister, human element is at fault.
14 February 1988Jessica is summoned to Savannah to help a friend with his play and receives an offer of marriage she didn't expect. Even more surprised are the man's plotting family.
21 February 1988While in Conneticut for a convention, Jessica hears the dying confession of a hit man and uncovers a mysterious safe house housing an important foreign dignitary.
28 February 1988The Gambini family winery is the take-over target of organized crime and it's up to Jessica to uncover who is behind the murder of a mafia hit man.
13 March 1988The death of an eccentric shut-in brings the burden of executing her will to Jessica. How does the legend that Benedict Arnold once slept in the woman's house and a possible "treasure" fit into the puzzle?
27 March 1988Jessica is delighted to return to New York City with the announcement of her nephew's impending engagement. But when a restaurant employee is found dead, the engagement is threatened. Norman Fell and Sonny Bono guest-star.
10 April 1988Jessica's niece is smitten with a rodeo rider and refuses to believe he could have committed a murder.
Season 4, Episode 21: Deadpan
1 May 1988When one of Jessica's former students brings a play based on one of her novels to Broadway, she finds herself in the middle of a war of words between rival critics. Dean Stockwell and Lloyd Bochner guest star.
8 May 1988Jessica comes to the aid of yet another dear old friend running as a senatorial candidate. When the candidate's campaign manager is murdered, Jessica must help prove her innocence.
23 October 1988A chance encounter with her old British intelligence friend Michael Hagarty leaves Jessica standing over a dead Bulgarian diplomat and accused of murder. Incarcerated, she has to leave it up to Grady and Michael to prove her innocence.
30 October 1988After her publisher announces his impending retirement, Jessica heads to NYC where she is simultaneously wooed by potential new publishers and a smooth-talking jewel thief.
6 November 1988Jessica is perplexed by the apparent murder of an elderly man points to two simple-minded, spinster sisters he was living with. First appearance of Ron Masak as the new sheriff Mort Metzger.
13 November 1988A massive storm results in Jessica snowed in at a ski lodge with an Olympic men's ski team and a murderer on the loose.
20 November 1988When a former student is arrested for murder, Jessica heads to West Virginia to bail her out. The unfriendly town hinders her investigation.
27 November 1988In New York City researching her next book, Jessica is drawn into a mystery involving a priceless tiara, a reclusive former actress and a news reporter accused of murder.
18 December 1988Jessica is summoned to California where a recently recovered Air Force plane could pin a decades-old murder on her dead husband Frank.
1 January 1989Lee Goddard successfully coaxed Jessica to join him at his ranch in Arizona after the harrowing events of the previous episode, but intrigue and murder follow them there when a mysterious psychic joins them.
8 January 1989Grady's wedding day arrives, and so does an unpleasant fate for the shrewish housekeeper of his prospective father-in-law's estate.
15 January 1989The murder of a womanizing gambler leads to double lives being exposed in seemingly quaint and old-fashioned Cabot Cove.
5 February 1989Jessica aids yet another dear old friend in his search for his missing grandson.
12 February 1989While in New York, a missing shoe on the discovered dead body of a homeless person leads Jessica to believe the supposed accidental death was not an accident.
19 February 1989Jessica is suspicious when the appearance of the ghost of a long-dead witch burned at the stake coincides with the release of a book on the very subject.
26 February 1989Jessica is detained in Moscow when a spy attempts to smuggle film out of the Soviet Union in her handbag.
12 March 1989Jessica is summoned to her old alma mater when one of her college professors confesses to a murder Jessica believes he didn't really commit.
Season 5, Episode 16: Truck Stop
2 April 1989Jessica is detoured on her way to LA at a seedy truck stop where a series of murders makes it apparent she isn't there by accident.
9 April 1989A vindictive, tell-all work of fiction mirroring Cabot Cove sends the townspeople into an uproar, and when a murder occurs following the plot of the book it's up to Jessica to separate fact from fiction.
16 April 1989Jessica heads to Montana to aid a young friend editing the last manuscript of the late writer Trevor Hudson, but when murder results she must weed through the lies of Hudson's scheming family to uncover the truth.
30 April 1989Jessica encounters a man in Boston whom she is convinced is her neighbor from years back, but when the man denies it--and his wife claims the man is dead--Jessica recruits Harry McGraw to dig to the bottom of the mystery.
7 May 1989Jessica visits her nephew Johnny, recently recruited onto a Major League Baseball team, and then must solve the murder of a scheming news reporter.
14 May 1989Eudora McVeigh, a rival mystery writer, arrives at Jessica's door with seemingly friendly intentions, but the discovery of a corpse and a web of deceit follows her to Cabot Cove leading Jessica to suspect the woman of ulterior and sinister motives.
21 May 1989Jessica fears the worst when Seth is poisoned, meanwhile Cabot Cove is abuzz when Eudora McVeigh is determined to fill Jessica's role in solving a local murder.
24 September 1989Jessica is detoured from a scheduled book tour after encountering MI6 agent Michael Haggerty and he convinces her to pose as his wife in Greece.
1 October 1989Cabot Cove's young, new priest finds himself in a sticky situation when a murderer confesses their crime and he recruits Jessica to help him uncover the truth without violating his oath of silence.
8 October 1989Jessica narrates a story from 40 years ago when another female mystery writer helped to solve a mysterious murder aboard the Queen Mary.
15 October 1989In Palm Springs, Jessica teams up with the local chief of police to figure out who killed a local investor and what happened to a large amount of money.
29 October 1989Jessica narrates the story of an ex-football player turned private eye who investigates the murder of his old teammate with the help of a savvy pooch.
5 November 1989Jessica's acquisition of an old bureau at a rummage sale unleashes a chain of events that leads to the death of a local volunteer fireman in a furniture store.
12 November 1989Voodoo black magic is the apparent cause of death of her host, leaving Jessica to figure out the truth while visiting an old friend in Jamaica.
19 November 1989Jessica is drawn into an appropriately melodramatic situation when a renowned opera singer is accused of murder in San Francisco.
26 November 1989On a dark and stormy night on a remote island, Jessica finds herself in the middle of a wealthy family squabbling over the inheritance of a millionaire.
Season 6, Episode 10: Class Act
3 December 1989Jessica narrates the tale of a burnt-out police detective sent to teach a university criminology class and challenges his students to solve a real homicide.
17 December 1989Scandal abounds during election time in Cabot Cove when the Mayor is reputed to have a secret wife who comes to confront him with murderous results.
7 January 1990Jessica narrates her newest novel about a bumbling private eye and his girlfriend inadvertently solving a murder by trying to cash in on a dead relative's will.
21 January 1990A womanizing Cabot Cove landlord is found murdered and Jessica must prove the innocence of a young boy's mother who is accused of the crime.
4 February 1990Jessica's trip to New York City to meet with her stockbroker becomes complicated when the broker is found murdered and his secretary charged with the crime.
11 February 1990Intrigue abounds in sunny California when Jessica's niece Victoria is accused of the murder of a rich movie heiress in Beverly Hills.
25 February 1990Murder occurs at the reunion of a variety show, site of a similar crime 25 years earlier.
4 March 1990A show cancellation coincides with a network executive's murder.
