Barney Miller is the kind of cop we'd all like to run into. Always sensible, he maintains order over a band of detectives who gamble, hit on anything in skirts, go to renaissance philosophy conventions for fun, and would really prefer to be writing. Nearly all of the action takes place in the squad room where citizens and criminals are brought in to complicate the mix.
Episodes
Wojo's proven innocent of a paternity suit, but at a cost; a beauty queen is robbed; an irate theater patron vandalizes the theater.
Luger wants Barney to pen a letter for his mail-order bride; a lottery winner seeks revenge when the ticket seller loses his winning entry; Harris gets a new book deal.
A car thief's conscience gets the better of him ... after twenty-five years; Levitt saves a child from a precarious fate; an overzealous sanitation officer goes to extremes.
A husband is assaulted for forcing his wife into designer jeans; a disorderly conduct report leads to a man who swears he's possessed by an evil spirit.
A job fair brings out the worst in a Peace Corps recruiter; Dietrich volunteers for a department stress experiment.
A manufacturer of computer game processors is accused of espionage; a WAC supplements her income on the street.
The 12th is overrun with homeless vagrants on Christmas; a greeting-card writer snaps; a cattle prod is the weapon of choice for a local merchant.
The penultimate survivor of a tontine attempts suicide in order to concede the money to his cousin.
The detectives don uniforms while Levitt and the others take sergeant's exams; Luger, working with the squad, is overly rough with a collar, and later with Barney.
Street clowns fall prey to a serial mugger; a hundred inmates are sneaked out of holding in the middle of the night.
A murder witness is uncooperative, so he, Harris and Dietrich are forced to share an apartment in seclusion until he talks; Lieutenant Scanlon falls for a wealthy mugging victim.
Unless he confesses soon, Harris and Dietrich's unwilling roommate may witness another murder. Meanwhile, harassment charges are pressed against Lieutenant Scanlon.
Dietrich aids an elderly psychiatric patient who may be speaking a foreign language; a nuclear activist goes on a hunger strike to end nuclear arms; Barney declines a deputy inspector nomination.
Luger's mail-order bride arrives; an elderly woman mugs a man.
A newspaper obituary causes a stir when the subject turns up alive; the detectives snag a modern-day chicken thief.
Internal Affairs is called in when a charge of excessive force is leveled against Wojo; an angry parent takes action when his child is declined admission into an exclusive kindergarten.
Dietrich's old flame pays a visit; a former child actor clubs an agent with a telephone.
Harris and Arnold come to blows; a mugging victim confesses to a twenty-five year old crush on Barney.
A museum presses charges when an Indian retrieves his tribe's ancestral bones from an exhibit; a scoutmaster catches a mugger.
Wojo's discover of an ancient weapon puts the 12th Precinct up for sale.
The 12th Precinct is sold; Dietrich arrests the head of a crime school; Luger tries to duck out on his mail-order bride.
Friends, foes and felons alike drop by to pay their last respects as the detectives prepare to leave for new assignments; Harris contemplates his resignation when he's assigned to Flushing Meadows; Barney recalls friends departed before he turns out the squad room lights for the last time.
