Law & Order
Criminal Law
TV Flash files “Criminal Law” as hour 358 of 545 in the TV Flash guide — Law & Order (1990–2010) on NBC, season 16, episode 9, aired 2005-11-23, 60 min.
From the desk
How this hour is filed
This leaf is S16E09: listed hour 358 of 545 in the Law & Order guide, hour 9 of 22 in season 16. It aired 2005-11-23 (60 min). The listed hour before it is “New York Minute” (S16E08). Next is “Acid” (S16E10). Broadcast log — titles and dates, not a plot bible.
Catalog log
Broadcast listing — not a TV Flash recap.
The deaths of three women with the same name lead Fontana and Green to the nine-year-old conviction of Leland Barnes, who had shot and killed his wife in an office full of people. With two of the three witnesses against him dead and Jack McCoy on the hit list, the detectives struggle to determine how Barnes, who has been in prison the entire time, got someone on the outside to kill the only people who could keep him in jail. The investigation leads them to Leland's two sons, with surprising results.
Viewer FAQ
Where does Criminal Law sit in the Law & Order guide?
S16E09 is listed hour 358 of 545 — hour 9 of 22 in season 16, season 16 episode 9.
When did Law & Order S16E09 air?
Criminal Law aired 2005-11-23 and is listed at 60 minutes.
Do I watch in order, or is it modular?
Modular is the point. Cases close. Casts change. Start anywhere in the original 1990–2010 run and you will understand the clang within twenty minutes. Order matters only if you care which partner is standing next to whom.
In the series
Why this series still plays
For the walnut that became a city: street then courtroom, a clang as civic punctuation, and two decades of interchangeable parts that taught TV how to clone a night. Comfort is the feature. The original 1990–2010 cathedral still teaches the form; the revival is the machine refusing to clock out.
Picture a Tuesday when the nation still had a cop show that split like a walnut: first the street, then the courtroom, a clang on the soundtrack that became civic punctuation. Law & Order premiered September 13, 1990, on NBC, created by Dick Wolf, and it did not invent the procedural so much as industrialize it. Prescription for Death is the template in miniature — a hospital night, a dead patient, cops then lawyers, no hug required. On the palate: newsprint, a New York that looks like a location budget with a…
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