Quotes

[Opening narration]

Narrator: In the criminal justice system, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups: the police, who investigate crime; and the district attorneys, who prosecute the offenders. These are their stories.

Det. Lennie Briscoe: You know, if I didn't already know you don't have kids, I'd know you don't have kids.

Det. Lennie Briscoe: We got a hit on the fake fur.

Det. Rey Curtis: Yeah, you'll never guess what they make them out of.

Lt. Anita Van Buren: Recycled soda bottles. What else did you find out?

Ben Stone: The jury should look like society. People that represent the victim as well as the defendant

[Trying to keep a suspect from escaping through a window]

Det. Ed Green: Rock, paper, scissors, gun.

Jack McCoy: I remember how hard it was when I realized my father was a son of a bitch. I can't imagine what it must be like when you realize you raised one.

Det. Lennie Briscoe: I'm trying to decide what to arrest you for - obstruction of justice, harboring a fugitive or just being a general pain in the ass!

Jack McCoy: You son of a bitch! You played me!

Det. Lennie Briscoe: I want to go to law school so I can learn how to turn gold into lead.

Jack McCoy: Your grief might seem a little more real had you not just admitted you cut off your wife's head.

Jack McCoy: Sometimes you have to make deals with the devil.

Jamie Ross: Just make sure you don't get your eyebrows singed.

Lt. Anita Van Buren: If he's not Fallon, who the hell is he?

Det. Lennie Briscoe: Well the FBI says he's not in the witness protection program but they mighta had their fingers crossed.

Lt. Anita Van Buren: Do you believe him?

Det. Lennie Briscoe: I believe on a good day he couldn't hit his ass with both hands.

Danielle Melnick: Hello, Jack. Ok, let's talk turkey. What are you up to?... And don't give me that party line about Prusse being a threat to society.

Jack McCoy: When you argue, I have this compulsive need to argue back.

Det. Lennie Briscoe: Love - a dangerous disease instantly cured by marriage.

Adam Schiff: A motive pulled straight from the tabloids. And what about means and opportunity? Are you getting that from comic books?

Det. Lennie Briscoe: Just like the Bates Hotel. They check in but they never check out.

Lt. Anita Van Buren: I'd like it if you two became real partners.

Detective Lennie Briscoe: And I'd like it if my ex-wives got partners. No more alimony.

[upon learning that an old gangster had himself killed to frame his cheating young wife and her boyfriend]

DA Branch: Well, I guess it beats dousing yourself in rum and lighting up a Cohiba.

ADA Jack McCoy: There comes a time in everyone's political career when you have to expect a couple over easy in the kisser.

ADA Serena Southerlyn: So, her sex life is way better than mine, so what?

Det. Ed Green: [a suspect, who'd complained of radiating pain in his neck, tries to escape from his apartment; Green goes to apprehend him] That's good, now radiate your ass up against the wall!

Det. Rey Curtis: When I filled out my ethnicity, I had to put "Other"...

[looking at a murder victim]

Det. Ed Green: Bare foot, cross painted on her chest. Looks like we're dealing with some religious nut.

Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: I got another body coming in. Guy took a javelin to the chest.

Det. Lennie Briscoe: Why are you still in this line of work?

Medical Examiner Elizabeth Rodgers: Free javelins.

[looking at a hospital sign that says "Pediatric Oncology"]

Det. Lennie Briscoe: Now there's two words that should never go together.

Jack McCoy: The last time I checked, "Stupid" isn't a defense for murder!

Ben Stone: I'm a Catholic - I can feel guilty about anything.

Adam Schiff: Flipped a coin in my head. Came up tails. Talk to the boy.

[about gay marriage]

Jack McCoy: Let 'em marry. Why shouldn't they be as miserable as the rest of us?

Lt. Anita Van Buren: It wasn't the eighteen floors from the window to the street that killed her, it was the sudden stop.

ADA Jack McCoy: Sometimes Lennie Briscoe doesn't hit it out of the park.

Abbie Carmichael: Gentleman, if we can just lower the amount of testosterone...