The Big Stop

Originally Aired: May 4, 1954

Dragnet #246, "The Big Stop," begins with a routine morning at Los Angeles Police Department's Homicide Division, where Sergeant Joe Friday and his partner Frank Smith are wrapping up a suicide case. Their day takes a violent turn when they receive an urgent call about a shooting at the corner of Broadway and San Julian: a traffic officer has been gunned down in broad daylight.

When Friday and Smith arrive at the scene, they find the wounded officer lying in a pedestrian crosswalk with a gunshot wound to the chest, his service revolver still holstered. Witness Roy Hickock provides a chilling account of what happened. A young man in a dark blue sedan stopped for a red light in the middle of the crosswalk. When the traffic officer approached, apparently to ask him to back up, the driver suddenly opened fire without warning, shooting the officer multiple times before speeding away through the panicked crowd. With only a partial description of the suspect and his vehicle, Friday and Smith face the daunting task of tracking down a cold-blooded cop killer somewhere in the sprawling city of Los Angeles.