Law & Order: Special Victims Unit is an American crime drama television series created by Dick Wolf's own production company, Wolf Entertainment, for NBC. The first spin-off of Law & Order, it starred Christopher Meloni as Det. Elliot Stabler until Meloni left the series in 2011 after 12 seasons, and Mariska Hargitay as Detective Olivia Benson, now the commanding officer of the Special Victims Unit after originally having been Stabler's partner in a fictionalized version of the New York City Police Department. Meloni reprised his role as Stabler in 2021 in the spin-off series Law & Order: Organized Crime. Law & Order: Special Victims Unit follows the style of the original Law & Order in that some episodes are loosely based on real crimes that have received media attention.
TruTV is an American basic cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The channel primarily broadcasts comedy docusoaps and reality shows.
Judge Judy is an American arbitration-based reality court show presided over by former Manhattan Family Court Judge Judith Sheindlin. The show features Sheindlin as she adjudicated real-life small-claims disputes within a simulated courtroom set. Prior to the proceedings, all involved parties signed arbitration contracts agreeing to Sheindlin's ruling. The show aired in first-run syndication. It is distributed by CBS Media Ventures.
Regina Rene King is an American actress and director. She is the recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, three Peabody Awards and four Primetime Emmy Awards, the most Primetime Emmy wins for an African-American performer. In 2019, Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world.
The CSI effect, also known as the CSI syndrome and the CSI infection, is any of several ways in which the exaggerated portrayal of forensic science on crime television shows such as CSI: Crime Scene Investigation influences public perception. The term was first reported in a 2004 USA Today article describing the effect being made on trial jurors by television programs featuring forensic science. It most often refers to the belief that jurors have come to demand more forensic evidence in criminal trials, thereby raising the effective standard of proof for prosecutors. While this belief is widely held among American legal professionals, some studies have suggested that crime shows are unlikely to cause such an effect, although frequent CSI viewers may place a lower value on circumstantial evidence. As technology improves and becomes more prevalent throughout society, people may also develop higher expectations for the capabilities of forensic technology.
Cops is an American television documentary reality legal programming television series that is currently in its 33rd season. It is produced by Langley Productions. It premiered on the Fox network on March 11, 1989. The series, known for chronicaling the lives of police officers, follows city police officers and sheriff's deputies, sometimes backed up by state police or other state agencies, during patrol, calls for service, and other police activities including prostitution and narcotic stings, and occasionally the serving of search/arrest warrants at criminal residences. Some episodes have also featured federal agencies. The show assigns television camera crews to accompany police as they perform their duties. The show's formula follows the cinéma vérité convention, which does not consist of any narration, scripted dialogue or incidental music/added sound effects, depending entirely on the commentary of the officers and on the actions of the people with whom they come into contact, giving the audience a fly on the wall point of view. Each episode typically consists of three self-contained segments which often ended with one or more arrests.
Nancy Ann Grace is an American legal commentator and television journalist. She hosted Nancy Grace, a nightly celebrity news and current affairs show on HLN, from 2005 to 2016, and Court TV's Closing Arguments from 1996 to 2007. She also co-wrote the book Objection!: How High-Priced Defense Attorneys, Celebrity Defendants, and a 24/7 Media Have Hijacked Our Criminal Justice System. Grace was also the arbiter of Swift Justice with Nancy Grace in the syndicated courtroom reality show's first season.
Starlet Marie Jones, better known as Star Jones, is an American lawyer, journalist, television personality, fashion designer, author, and women's and diversity advocate. She is best known as one of the first co-hosts on the ABC morning talk show The View, which she appeared on for nine seasons from 1997-98 through 2005-06. She was also one of sixteen contestants of the fourth installment of The Celebrity Apprentice in 2011, coming in fifth place.
Court TV is an American digital broadcast network and former cable television channel. It was originally launched in 1991 with a focus on crime-themed programs such as true crime documentary series, legal analysis talk shows, and live news coverage of prominent criminal cases. In 2008, the original cable channel became TruTV. The channel relaunched on May 8, 2019 as a digital broadcast television network owned by Katz Broadcasting, a subsidiary of the E. W. Scripps Company. Court TV is also available via streaming services such as YouTube TV and Pluto TV, and its audio feed is available on Sirius XM channel 793.
The Court of Last Resort is an American television dramatized court show which aired October 4, 1957 – April 11, 1958, on NBC. It was co-produced by Erle Stanley Gardner's Paisano Productions, which also brought forth the long-running hit CBS-TV law series, Perry Mason.
A court show is a broadcast programming subgenre of either legal dramas or reality legal programming. Court shows present content mainly in the form of legal hearings between plaintiffs and defendants presided over by a judge.
Faith Elizabeth Lattimore is an American attorney, legal commentator and media personality. On March 11, 2014, she joined MSNBC as a legal analyst. Currently, she is presiding judge over the long-running courtroom series Divorce Court. She was also the arbitrator on Judge Faith, a daytime court show, where she rendered decisions in a television courtroom. The court show ended production in 2018.
Cold Justice is an investigative true crime series originally broadcast on TNT and currently on Oxygen. The series, produced by Dick Wolf, follows former Harris County, Texas prosecutor Kelly Siegler and a team of investigators as they re-open unsolved murder cases with the consent and assistance of local law enforcement. Crime scene investigator Yolanda McClary, a veteran of the Las Vegas Metro police, also appeared on the series; McClary had earlier been the inspiration for Catherine Willows, the character portrayed by Marg Helgenberger on the series CSI.
Ion Mystery is an American free-to-air television network owned by the Katz Broadcasting subsidiary of the E. W. Scripps Company. It focuses primarily on mystery, true crime, and police/legal procedural programs.
True Crime Network is an American digital multicast television network that is operated by True Crime Network, LLC, a limited liability company, which is owned by Tegna Inc. The network specializes in true crime, investigation and forensic science documentary programming aimed at adults – with a skew toward females – between the ages of 25 and 54.
Racial biases are a form of implicit bias, which refers to the attitudes or stereotypes that affect an individual's understanding, actions, and decisions in an unconscious manner. These biases, which encompass unfavorable assessments, are often activated involuntarily and without the awareness or intentional control of the individual. Residing deep in the subconscious, these biases are different from known biases that individuals may choose to conceal for the purposes of social and/or political correctness. Police officers have implicit bias, regardless of their ethnicity. Racial bias in criminal news reporting in the United States is a manifestation of this bias.
Marilyn Mosby is an American politician and lawyer who has been the State's Attorney for Baltimore since 2015. She is the youngest chief prosecutor of any major American city. She is currently under federal indictment.
Television consumption is a major part of media consumption in Western culture. Similar to other high-consumption ways of life, television watching is prompted by a quest for pleasure, escape, and "anesthesia." Obsessively watching television can be compared with common criteria for addictions, such as the inability to function at work or home, and negative consequences may arise from heavy or addictive consumption.
Fox Crime is an Australian subscription television channel primarily screening crime drama television series. The channel launched on 7 November 2019, replacing TVHits.
