3rd Season
2001-2002
#1 The Last Word
#2 Off the Grid
#3 Darkness for Light
#4 The Right Thing to Do
#5 Look Closer
#6 The Unbearable Lightness of Being Family
#7 Imbroglio
#8 Rights of Passage
 		#9 Surprised by Gravity
#10 Beating the Bounds
#11 Crime and Puzzlement
#12 Who Shot Dick
#13 The Cook of the Money Pot
#14 The Extinction of the Dinosaurs
#15 Can They Do That with Vegetables?
#16 Woman in Cacti with a Curled Up Rat
 		#17 Not Stumbling, but Dancing
#18 The Justice League of America
#19 Men Aren't Monsters
#20 The Bottle Show
#21 Tidal Wave
#22 Boston Terriers from France
#23 Nobody Expects the Spanish Inquisition
#24 Come Back Soon
Other seasons
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

#1 The Last Word: Aired Tuesday, September 25, 2001

The annoying Stuart Collins returns to Hartford after getting fired from the Governor's office, and blames Amy for his dismissal. While Amy is giving Stuart a piece of her mind about how ridiculous he is for blaming her, he has a heart attack. Amy tries to find Stuart's family or friends to contact, but can't find anyone. When Stuart miraculously recovers from what could have been a fatal cardiac incident, he admits to Amy that he's loved her since the first time he saw her. Maxine works with a couple, the Crouses, who are considering giving up their adopted daughter, Leslie, due to her constant violent outbursts. Unfortunately, Maxine gets there a little too late, and finds Leslie smothered to death by Mrs. Crouse. Vincent prepares to move with Carole and has a book-signing. Although Amy and Vincent haven't been speaking, she shows up for his book-signing. Amy and Bruce are having more and more trouble drawing the line between their professional and personal relationship. Amy hears a case in which the son of a mob boss, Henry Pagano, is being accused of setting fire to a local market. The witnesses in the case have obviously been intimidated by Pagano, but the one real victim, a sixteen-year-old boy who was burned, is very eloquent. Amy gives the Pagano kid his just desserts, and is surprised when his father is grateful for her teaching his kid a lesson rather than letting him get away with it.

top
#2 Off the Grid: Aired Tuesday, October 2, 2001

Maxine is missing and Vincent and Sean start to panic, but it turns out that she just took a beaten woman into hiding and didn't tell anyone but Peter so that Vincent and Amy would come together in their panic. Her plan backfires and Vincent and Amy just fight more. Amy presides over two cases that disgust her. The first is a lawyer who tries to trick money out of the estate of a recently deceased rich man by saying he has an illegitimate daughter in Guatemala. The second is two kids who attack a Live the Lord club with eggs and try to excuse it by saying that the club should not be meeting on school property due to separation of church and state. Amy accepts a date with Stuart Collins and is surprised when she not only has a good time but she kisses him. Vincent finds a lump in Carole's breast and is disturbed when she decides to ignore it, but she finally gives up denial and agrees to go to a doctor.

top
#3 Darkness for Light: Aired Tuesday, October 9, 2001

Amy and Vincent still aren't getting along. Donna tries to get Vincent's book to break the 1,000 mark on an important web site by buying and returning the book over and over again, but just gets herself banned from the web site. Peter is pleased when Amy shows up to watch his rocket competition, and everyone celebrates when he breaks 1,000 feet. Amy adjudicates a case in which a high school gang leader is actually keeping the peace, and a young girl illegally plays the stock market to her advantage. Both Maxine and Amy are weirded out when they see Sean and Bruce enjoying lunch together. Maxine hunts down a young abused girl's old dog, and the girl is pleased to find out that at least her dog found a happy home, even if she didn't. Maxine is annoyed when Sean tries to get her to do more DCF business and less Sanctuary House work. Amy lets Stuart Collins seduce her before he goes on a pilgrimage to Sri Lanka.

top
#4 The Right Thing to Do: Aired Tuesday, October 16, 2001

Carole freaks out about the fact that she has breast cancer and tries to push Vincent away and cancel their plans to move to San Francisco together. With a nudge from Donna, Vincent tracks Carole down and proposes to her. She happily accepts. With a permanent move to China on the horizon, Jared Duff proposes to Maxine. Maxine doesn't want to leave her commitments in Hartford and turns him down. They end up breaking up. Maxine speaks her mind and pisses off her co-workers when a pompous politician comes to visit Sanctuary House along with TV cameras. Amy has to make a decision in a difficult case in which a hospital recommends that conjoined newborns be surgically separated, which would kill one of them, while the twins' parents want to take their babies home as they are. Bruce advises Amy when she makes a bad choice during the decision-making proces and Amy gets upset with him, but she later apologizes and admits he was right which leads a new understanding of their relationship.

top
#5 Look Closer: Aired Tuesday, October 23, 2001

Bruce convinces Amy to sentence a kid and his family to Bruce and Sean's Gun 101 program, where Bruce and Sean try to teach people how to settle conflicts without violence. Unfortunately, Bruce needs to threaten the whole family with jail in order to get them to stay in the class, and in the end the father still refuses and ends up getting locked up. Amy adjudicates a case in which two teenage girls are accused of causing a classmate's suicide by writing cruel lies about her sexual practices on a web site. Maxine and Amy are horrified when they learn second-hand that Carole has cancer and Vincent and Carole eloped to Las Vegas. Sanctuary House cuts one too many corners and a judge comes down hard on them. Maxine realizes that this is payback for her mouthing off to pompous politician on TV, and resigns to save Sanctuary House.

top
#6 The Unbearable Lightness of Being Family: Aired Tuesday, October 30, 2001

Maxine finally gets Vincent and Amy talking by convincing Vincent to consult Amy as a lawyer regarding the movie deal for his book. Maxine gets back into the swing of things at DCF after being forced to resign from Sanctuary House. She helps a homeless man who is going to be arrested for blowing bubbles in the park without a license, and shows a younger colleague what it takes to save a child from an abusive home. Amy prevents a woman from taking her daughter to France for two years and ostensibly prevents the woman from being able to go to France herself. Bruce struggles to get through to a woman whose son has cerebral palsy. The woman has lost herself in self-help books and seems to be in denial of her son's problems. Vincent's family is planning a surprise party for Vincent's wedding and going-away, but Vincent has to leave before the party because Carole has to get a mastectomy. Vincent bids a fond farewell to Donna even though she is in denial of his leaving. Donna recites a Shakespeare sonnet in a show and dedicates her performance to Vincent. Amy sends Vicent off with tears and the family surfing monkey, always given to the Gray family member who needs luck.

top
#7 Imbroglio: Aired Tuesday, November 6, 2001

Maxine tries to help a girl whose father is very strict and has turned all three of his daughters into spelling bee champions by home-schooling them. Gillian is horrified when she realizes that she is the reason Ned didn't get into a premiere preschool. Amy is attracted to Bruce's friend Larry, but is surprised when she finds out he's a priest. Amy is hesitant, but she takes Larry up on his offer about talking about some of the things going on in her life like her brother leaving and her best friend dying. Amy can't believe she has to tell a woman in court to stop breast-feeding her six-year-old son. Amy helps an amicably divorced couple who are arguing over whether or not to send their 22-month-old mute-by-choice daughter to therapy.

top
#8 Rights of Passage: Aired Tuesday, November 20, 2001

Bruce tries to help a young black kid who is on probation and having trouble toeing the line because his gang won't let him go. It doesn't help that the kid's probation officer is also a bigot. While Bruce is busy, Donna acts as Amy's CSO, and Amy's docket may never recover. Amy hears the case of a young blonde kid who has surprisingly strong ties to his native American roots. Amy decides to release him into the custody of his elders rather than send him to a mental hospital as the state representative wishes. Maxine's nephew Kyle shows up and helps Maxine diagnose a group of foster kids with burns on their arms as simply being kids rather than abused kids. Kyle made it through four years of medical school, but was kicked out due to his drug addiction before he got his M.D. Kyle reaches out to Maxine for help, and she offers to let him live in the Gray family homestead. Amy is horrified that Kyle is coming to live with them.

top
#9 Surprised by Gravity: Aired Tuesday, November 27, 2001

Amy is still very much against Kyle moving in, and has trouble even being civil to him around the house. Kyle gets a job at the local fast-food restaurant, Giggle Burger. Amy is feels guilty when three boys that she sentenced to pick up garbage along the road-side are hit and killed by a drunk driver. Oddly enough, it's Kyle that gives Amy some resolution and comfort. Amy adjudicates a case in which an adventurous couple takes their toddler sky-diving and on other dangerous adventures, and the state is trying to take their son away from this unsafe environment. Maxine gets involved in the strange case of a thirty-eight-year old miscarried fetus found underneath an old brick wall. It turns out that one of three old spinster sisters has long been hiding a secret from her family.

top
#10 Beating the Bounds: Aired Tuesday, December 11, 2001

When Lauren starts asking Amy questions about divorce that Amy has trouble answering, she takes an opportunity presented to her by a young police officer who wants a divorce ceremony with her ex-husband. Maxine encourages Kyle to mentor a boy who seems to have a death wish when he continually tries to break the world record for holding his breath underwater. Amy feels marked for something when Judge Keeler begins observing her court room. Amy adjudicates a case in which a girl is accused of assualting three boys in a gang with a baseball bat. The girl claims the act wasn't a gang initiation, but instead she was trying to protect stray dogs from being abused. Amy chooses not to legally emancipate a 17-year-old boy who wants to have a say in whether or not his father, who is in a coma, remains on life-support. Amy feels guilty when Bruce asks for the day off and she doesn't give it to him, only to later find out that she kept him from working on an important take-home exam. Amy tries to prevent Kyle from talking to Lauren, and finally admits that the reason she's so anti-Kyle is because of something that Kyle did with Vincent back in the summer of 1992 when Vincent, then 16, went to visit Kyle, 19, in his first apartment in New York City.

top
#11 Crime and Puzzlement: Aired Tuesday, December 18, 2001

With a little spurring from Vincent's ex-boss, Amy starts investigating Judge Keeler's rulings and realizes that he's been taking bribes from a certain law firm. Judge Keeler figures out what Amy is doing, and Amy later finds out that two lawyers have filed complaints about her and are trying to get her impeached. Kyle has a rocky start working at a clinic for recovering teenage drug addicts, but ends up being rewarded for his individuality. Maxine is frustrated by a woman who wants to give up her children because she believes she can no longer keep them safe. When the woman's sister refuses to help, Maxine wonders why she took in Kyle herself. She is rewarded when Kyle has a good day at work and spreads the love by bringing Maxine a present. Amy sentences an inconsiderate teen who disturbs the peace to listen to Donna's Broadway show tunes, and ends up instilling in the rap-fan teen a love for Broadway. Bruce has difficulty setting up a play-date for Rebecca when first he can't find Rebecca's friends mother, and then finds out that the mother is a recovering drug-addicts. He's even more surprised when the mother tells Bruce that Rebecca is a bad influence on her own child.

top
#12 Who Shot Dick: Aired Tuesday, January 8, 2002

Donna asks Amy to take care of Ariadne if anything should happen to her, and is disappointed when Amy says she'll have to think about it. Gillian volunteers her and Peter to take care of Ariadne if Donna dies. Amy deals with a difficult surrogate mother case, and is furious when Judge Keeler has it removed from her docket and has her threatened by a security guard. A superior judge comes in to settle the matter between Amy and Judge Keeler. Judge Krumble gives Amy a slap on the write and recommends to Judge Keeler that he consider early retirement. Richard, Kyle's father, comes to town and offers to bail Kyle out. Kyle turns him down. Kyle and Amy make some peace over how Kyle got Vincent busted for driving stoned many years ago. Maxine reunites a father and son after the father finally stops drinking. Bruce and Andrea take their daughters on a play date and then take themselves on a adult date the next day.

top
#13 The Cook of the Money Pot: Aired Tuesday, January 15, 2002

After Kyle gets caught having sex by Lauren, Gillian volunteers to help him get his own apartment. Gillian suggests Kyle move into Vincent's old place and Kyle decides to go through the motions because he figures it'll freak Amy out so much that she'll ask him to stay at Maxine's. Kyle's plan backfires he ends up as Donna's new roommate. Amy hears a case in which two kids are accused of putting a man in a coma by stealing a stop sign. Amy is leaning towards letting the kids off when the news comes in that the man has died. From the kids' reaction to the news, Amy realizes they are indeed guilty. Kyle has trouble figuring out when to bend the rules at work. Amy is scared by a sixteen-year-old boy in her courtroom who has been impersonating a cop for eight months. Maxine has to decide whether a mother who was jailed for killing her own child should go back to her family when she's out on parole, while the mother simply insists that she's innocent. During Maxine's investigation, it becomes clear that the woman's sons suffer from an unusual disease that makes them more susceptible to bruising, and the long-suffering mother realizes that she did indeed kill her own son since a light slap could be fatal for a child with such a disease.

top
#14 The Extinction of the Dinosaurs: Aired Tuesday, January 22, 2002

Peter tries to get Amy to join him in the Polar Bear Club. Amy is concerned by a kid who writes a play about the underdog killing the bullies and getting the girl and who sees the Holocaust as a cautionary tale about revenge against those on top. Bruce brings Andrea along when he stakes out a bar to make sure a recovering alcoholic mother isn't drinking again. With help from Kyle, Maxine hunts down a gay sixteen-year-old who ran away from his foster home after being outed. Maxine invites him into her own home. Maxine is horrified by the way Teen Harbor is run, and when she sees a drug deal on the back steps of the shelter she calls the cops and has the place shut down. Amy goes to a formal business dinner with Judge Krumble and isn't sure if it's a date or not, but is more distracted by a table-mate who can't stop ragging on the juvenile justice system. Later that night, Judge Krumble suggests they go on a real date. Donna begs Kyle to babysit and Kyle refuses, but he comes to her aid at the last minute with gay sixteen-year-old who has experience babysitting.

top
#15 Can They Do That with Vegetables?: Aired Tuesday, February 5, 2002

Kyle is frustrated when X-Ray, an old teen from Teen Harbor, tries to get AIDS because he thinks it will help him find an apartment. Maxine tries to get Eric, the gay teen she got off the streets by bringing him to her home, to go to a perfect foster home, but he comes straight back to her house the next day. Amy hears a case of a teen with emphysema who is suing a tobacco company. Amy has to rule in favor of the tobacco company when it is made perfectly clear that the teen got emphysema through a genetic deficiency. Gillian tries to make friends with a black couple for Ned's sake but she tries too hard and the night ends in disaster. Amy goes on a real date with Judge Krumble and they have a nice time.

top
#16 Woman in Cacti with a Curled Up Rat: Aired Tuesday, February 26, 2002

Amy gets frustrated with men when her ex-husband plans a birthday extravaganza for Lauren without checking it with her first and Judge Krumble doesn't call her after their pleasant date. Flowers help. Maxine plots with Kyle to get Teen Harbor back on its feet by finding a corporate sponsor and new leader in ex-social worker Joe MacKenzie. Amy is saddened by a case in which neither parent wants custody of their difficult sixteen-year-old daughter, Pamela. On Maxine's advice, Amy sends Pamela to a facility designed for difficult cases: Buckley Hills. Bruce plans a perfect evening for Andrea and himself and is taken aback when she cancels his reservations and plans them a romantic evening at her house. He tells her he likes to feel a little more in control and doesn't want to go to bed with her until he's ready... and then he realizes he's ready. Peter takes action when Gillian's painting teacher comes on to her.

top
#17 Not Stumbling, but Dancing: Aired Tuesday, March 5, 2002

Amy refuses to return a child to a pregnant woman who has not bettered her life in any way during the two years since her child was originally taken away by DCF. Instead, the angry young woman simply blames circumstance for her lack of job or residence. The woman leaves the jurisdiction with her unborn baby and calls Amy to tell her to get bent and die. Maxine helps to peacefully resolve a stand-off between a large number of armed policemen and three scared children who have been brain-washed by their mother that the government is their enemy. Amy sentences a nerdy high school student after he admits that he beat another boy because he thought the boy was beating his girlfriend. When the pretty girlfriend testifies that she never claimed any such thing, Amy suspects correctly that the poor nerd was the victim of a cruel high school prank. Lauren makes dinner for the family as a class assignment.

top
#18 The Justice League of America: Aired Tuesday, March 26, 2002

Amy goes to her 10-year law school reunion, and even though Barry Krumble offers to go with her, she turns him down. Amy first finds out she isn't registered, and secondly finds out that she's somehow been reported as dead. Reuniting with old friends is an exercise being hit on by her ex-boyfriend and her ex-husband, and being cut down by her competitive old best friend. Barry shows up just in time to be her white knight with some good news, and they end up sleeping together for the first time. Maxine has a walk-in teen who turns out to be Pamela, the teen that Amy sent to Buckley Hills. Pamela has run away, and claims that Buckley Hills maltreated her. Maxine has to pass her off to her colleague, Robert, due to the conflict of interest. Maxine and Sean stay up all night after Maxine gets a call from a suicidal 12-year-old boy. With calls throughout the night, Maxine realizes that the boy felt cheated when she reassigned one of his fellow foster kids to a better place. When dawn comes, Sean leads a team to save the boy, and brings him back to Maxine's office. Robert tells Maxine that Pamela commit suicide after she was sent back to Buckley Hills.

top
#19 Men Aren't Monsters: Aired Tuesday, April 2, 2002

The Grays' house is ransacked and vandalized and Lauren starts to feel unsafe in her own home. Amy finds out from an insensitive detective that it was a kid who appeared in her court room who broke into their home. Maxine convinces Sean, her boss, and Eric, the gay 16-year-old boy she reluctantly took in, that they should try living together as foster parent and child. Maxine begins to investigate Buckley Hills even though DCF has already officially checked the place out. Kyle doesn't get along with his new boss at Teen Harbor, Joe MacKenzie, very well. When a teen has an epileptic seizure, Joe learns Kyle is a doctor and encourages him to go back to his calling. Amy hears a case in which an overly concerned social worker thinks a child is being abused and neglected just because his father pushes him too hard at basketball and keeps switching his school to get him on the best team. Amy dismisses the case and scolds the overzealous social worker. Bruce spends the night at Andrea's house even though her daughter, Gracie, is there and Gracie walks in on Bruce in the bathroom the next morning.

top
#20 The Bottle Show: Aired Tuesday, April 9, 2002

Amy is still seeing Barry and tells her mother that he may be something special. Amy hears the case of a teenage girl who is a born-again Christian and wants to get her mother give up being a stripper by filing a neglect charge against her. Andrea breaks up with Bruce when her ex-husband threatens to take her daughter away from her on charges that Bruce exposed himself to her. Bruce calls David, Andrea's ex-husband, and David comes to taunt Bruce in person at work. Bruce loses his temper and attacks David, and is then arrested for assault. Maxine finds out Jared is back in town by seeing his picture in the newspaper. When Sean sees how upset Maxine is, he decides to hold a black-tie charity casino night to get a picture of Maxine all gussied up into the paper to drive Jared nuts. Sean's casino night is a bust, almost no one shows up, and Maxine decides to call Jared, but ends up hanging up on his answering machine. Donna finds a vial of morphine in Kyle's drawer and confronts him with it. He explains how he keeps it so that he makes a conscious choice every day not to do drugs. Donna is worried about how independent Ariadne is getting. Lauren feels like she needs a bigger wardrobe to compete with her friend.

top
#21 Tidal Wave: Aired Tuesday, April 23, 2002

Amy is worried that Maxine is over-working herself because she's upset that Jared Duff still hasn't called. Maxine thinks Amy is being silly. Amy throws another social worker in jail after she shows incompetence and indifference in her court room. Amy sentences two Jewish brothers to one year's detention after they are busted smuggling diamonds into the U.S. from Israel. Maxine tries hard to help Pamela Taylor's family with their class action suit against Buckley Hills by encouraging another woman who used to be at Buckley Hills to come forward. Maxine is frustrated by the lawyer she is working with, and collapses at work. Maxine didn't have a heart attack, but she's definitely not in good health. Donna encourages Kyle not to give up on his dream of being a doctor. Amy is forced to suspend Bruce after he is arrested for punching Andrea's ex-husband.

top
#22 Boston Terriers from France: Aired Tuesday, May 7, 2002

Amy hears a case in which a teenager has been keeping her secret baby in a storage closet at school, but it turns out that the baby isn't even hers. Amy fears the Bruce is changing his plea to guilty in the assault case against him. Kyle is frustrated when a runaway that he tried to help weeks earlier dies from a severe infection. Amy tries to get Maxine, who is on a forced medical leave from work, healthy by making her exercise and changing her diet. Maxine grows tired of Amy's hen-pecking and lashes out, saying that most of the stress in her life is caused by having her grown daughter living with her. Amy says she thinks it's time to move out.

top
#23 Nobody Expects the Spanish Inquisition: Aired Tuesday, May 14, 2002

Amy adjudicates a case in which a man is trying not to lose custody of his two sons, but refuses to take a paternity test to prove he's their biological father. Amy and Lauren move out of the family homestead and into a cheap apartment. Lauren expresses her discontent to everyone, including her father, who express his concern to Amy. Maxine decides to renovate the top floor of the house now that it's vacant. Vincent comes to visit and tries, unsuccessfully, to patch things up between Amy and Maxine. Amy breaks up with Barry. Donna goes out on a date with Amy's old law school classmate, Charles Manners, the radio lawyer. Amy worries that Bruce isn't properly defending himself in the assault case against him.

top
#24 Come Back Soon: Aired Tuesday, May 21, 2002

Maxine prematurely ends her leave of absence from work when her dentist turns her on to a case of a teenage girl being abused by her boyfriend. Jared returns to proclaim his love for Maxine and they have a passionate reunion... that includes an engagement ring. Amy and Donna can't stand their new temporary CSO, Ian Janowski, who is assigned while Bruce is on trial. Against Bruce's wishes, Amy testifies as a character witness on his behalf. Bruce avoids jail time, but he is fired by Amy's higher-ups as Amy's CSO. Amy and Lauren hate their temporary apartment with its noisy neighbors, and Michael uses Amy's new living arrangements as an excuse to file for full custody of Lauren. Amy adjudicates a case in which a young single mother locked her kids in the trunk of her car while she went to work. Maxine considers taking in boarders now that Amy has moved out, but after her reunion with Jared, the real estate representative convinces her to sell. Amy is horrified to see the For Sale sign.

top
Other seasons
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6