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Matlock Season 1 Episodes
Season 1 Episode Guide
24 Episodes 1986 - 1987
Episode 1
Diary of a Perfect Murder
Mon, Mar 3, 1986100 mins
This was Andy Griffith's first appearance as defense attorney, Ben Matlock. He has to defend a television reporter, who was approached by his ex-wife about an important story. After she is murdered, Ben is hired to defend him. Aiding Ben is his daughter, Charlene, another lawyer, and his legman, Tyler Hudson.
Episode 2
The Judge
Tue, Sep 23, 198649 mins
Ben, who charges his clients six figures, is told by Charlene that she wants to do some pro bono work. He says OK. She already has a case. A moneyless young man is charged with killing his girlfriend. They were in her apartment and he went into the bathroom to shower. By the time he came out she had been stabbed to death by the older man who is keeping her -- infuriated by her infidelity in the apartment whose rent he is paying and who just happens to be the judge who will preside at the trial of the same young man he is trying to frame. The young man picks up the knife just when hotel security (alerted by the murderer on a house phone anonymously) break in. After the initial court hearing, in his chambers, the judge (an acquaintance of Ben who knows how good a lawyer-investigator Ben Matlock is) asks if the cagey lawyer would be willing to hand the case off to a new lawyer, who is just starting out, which would serve as good experience for an up-and-coming young attorney, especially as it is a pro bono case. The judge has good cause for concern. But Ben declines and later goes to the the girl's expensive apartment and learns she is from a working-class background. So, how could she have afforded the apartment, among other luxuries? They also learn that she may have been seeing another man, older and who smoked a pipe and drank a certain brand of cognac. Ben goes back to the judge-murderer, whom he knows smokes a pipe. Ben meets the judge at the bar and orders the same cognac, which the judge particularly enjoys. Ben starts wondering if the judge knows something about the murder or could even be the guilty party?
Episode 3
The Stripper
Tue, Sep 30, 198660 mins
A woman who after going through a messy divorce from her husband finds herself having to work as an exotic dancer. Her ex goes to see her and tells her he wants their son but she won't let him have their son. Later the man is killed and it appears that he was killed by a woman, so the ex-wife is arrested. Ben who represented her husband during the divorce and who regretted it, offers to defend her. He tries to find out who could have wanted to kill the man and frame his ex-wife.
Episode 4
The Affair
Tue, Oct 7, 198660 mins
The mother of Charlene's former boyfriend hires Ben to defend the woman who's accused of killing of her husband. Ben wonders why. She says that her husband was a philanderer and the woman was another one of his dalliances and she wants it known. Ben wonders who could have killed him and he naturally focuses on the family which includes the woman who hired him and the man's son.
Episode 5
The Seduction
Tue, Oct 14, 198648 mins
Football star Brad Bingham is accused of fatally bludgeoning the team's owner Cynthia Hyland.
Episode 6
The Don: Part 1
Tue, Oct 28, 198660 mins
Ben and Charlene take the case of Mafia don Nicholas Baron accused of murdering business rival Don Kovacs; Charlene is attracted to Baron's son Paul.
Episode 7
The Don: Part 2
Tue, Nov 4, 198660 mins
Ben defends a organized-crime boss.
Episode 8
The Sisters
Tue, Nov 11, 198649 mins
Sisters Julia and Emily execute a clever and cold-hearted plan to murder their wealthy aunt and frame her husband Harold Scully. Ben reluctantly agrees to defend the annoying Scully and is faced with the challenge of breaking the seemingly airtight alibi of the sisters, and the strong bond between them.
Episode 9
The Cop
Sat, Nov 15, 198660 mins
After tough detective Joe Peters finds a fortune in his bank account, the mob frames him for Harry Landers' gunshot murder.
Episode 10
The Angel
Tue, Nov 25, 198649 mins
Spoiled rock star and party girl Angel goes to her manager Lou Pearson's house to patch up a drunken fight and passes out. When she comes to, he's been fatally stabbed in the chest with scissors. Ben reluctantly defends her.
Episode 11
The Professor
Tue, Dec 2, 198648 mins
Ben's law professor is arrested on charges of committing vehicular homicide. The man claims to have no recollection of what happened. Ben defends him. Ben suspects the man's assistant and two of his students of being behind the whole thing. He has to figure out why.
Episode 12
Santa Claus
Tue, Dec 9, 198660 mins
At Christmas time, a heartless businessman wants to evict the residents of an apartment building he owns, he tangles with a resident who just happens to be working as a street Santa. Later a man wearing a Santa suit enters the businessman's office building and kills him. Later someone enters the Santa's apartment and tangles with him. Later three of the businessman's people find him dead. Ben offers to defend the Santa. He suspects that one of the associates is the killer cause a piece of evidence against the Santa was found near the body and he believes who ever broke into the Santa's apartment took it and planted it.
Episode 13
The Chef
Tue, Jan 6, 198748 mins
Ben defends the host of a cooking show when her ex-husband appears on her show and he dies after tasting what she was preparing and it's no big secret that she hates him. Because he wrote a cookbook using her recipes. Later the police find what was used to kill him in her house, when they get an anonymous tip. Ben operates under the assumption that she's the intended target, because other than her, no one has reason to kill her ex-husband,,and normally she tastes what she cooks. And she narrows it down to three men who just happen to be at the taping. So Ben asks the arresting officer to accompany him and record the three men and see if he can identify the anonymous caller. And when he thinks who it might be, Ben goes to see him but finds the man dead.
Episode 14
The Author
Tue, Jan 13, 198748 mins
When a woman in a small town writes a book whose characters are actual people in the town and it becomes a best seller, the press converge on the town to interview them. And some of them threaten the woman. When the local reverend goes to visit her, someone takes a shot at her killing the reverend. The police investigate and it leads them to one of the town's doctors who was depicted in the book as being a druggie who denies it and threatened the woman. Ben comes to defend him and he starts by checking some of the other people depicted in the book but learns none of them have reason to kill her. Later Ben discovers a different motive and suspect for the killing.
Episode 15
The Rat Pack
Tue, Jan 20, 198748 mins
In Los Angeles, a woman is murdered and the police suspect her boyfriend. The accused goes to see Matlock, and asks for his advice. While his current lawyers want to plead him out, Ben tells him to fight. He agrees, and puts Ben in charge of the case. Matlock is suspicious of three friends who were with the victim and the accused the night of the murder. But which one is the real killer? Along with Tyler, Ben tries to figure it out, but he has a hard time navigating L.A.
Episode 16
The Nurse
Tue, Feb 3, 198748 mins
Kathy Dawson is a private nurse working for the St. John's. One night while she was out, the man she was taking care of, Peter St. John, has what appears to be a heart attack - and dies. When it's determined to be murder, Kathy is the prime suspect. Ben and an attractive redhead get into the Courthouse elevator, it malfunctions and they spend a few minutes alone together, to Ben's obvious delight. Ben arrives at Nurse Dawson's arraignment after taking her case with quite a retainer, the $250,000 engagement ring the deceased, Mr St. John, had given to her. As the Hearing gets under way, in rushes the new A.D.A. - it's the attractive redhead from the elevator, Julie March. The deceased's sister (Lacey St. John) tells A.D.A. March that the ring was actually stolen out of the safe, so the police seize it as evidence. Ben goes to the St. John residence and speaks with the sister, and Mrs Warren (the longtime housekeeper), he realizes that something just isn't adding up, and he's being lied to. Did Kathy kill Peter, then steal the fabulous ring as an engagement ruse . - or was it someone else?
Episode 17
The Convict
Tue, Feb 10, 198760 mins
A jury found a man, Les, guilty of murdering a friend, who had been also one of his business partners and one of his best buddies from Vietnam. Ben defended Les but lost. Seven years later Les receives a parole, but, before he leaves the prison, a fellow inmate attacks him with a knife; during the ensuing scuffle Les fatally stabs the assailant in self-defense. Ben then not only represents Les against the charge of the second death but also figures out what happened in the previous case.
Episode 18
The Court-Martial: Part 1
Tue, Feb 17, 198760 mins
A sadistic Army lieutenant pushes his men too hard. After a late-night poker game inside a back room of the officers' club, someone stabs him in the back with a bayonet, and he dies. The Army charges one of the soldiers in his company. The father of the accused is an old friend of Ben, so he hires Ben to defend his son. Ben investigates at the post, Tyler goes undercover, and Charlene lends a hand at a nearby night spot. Curious circumstances come to light. Before a preliminary hearing reconvenes, the defendant disappears.
Episode 19
The Court-Martial: Part 2
Tue, Feb 24, 198760 mins
Ben finds the defendant and returns him to the stockade, but a crucial witness (the only witness) disappears. Tyler discovers a drug-trafficking scheme in which the victim has taken part, Charlene finds out about the background, and Ben figures out the poker games, a cigar, the black book, the abuse, the divorce, the affair, and, of course, the murder. Ben even learns about military protocol and Army judicial procedure.
Episode 20
The Therapist
Tue, Mar 3, 198760 mins
A famous movie star, staying incognito at a special clinic, becomes outraged when his presence there is leaked to the media. When the doctor is found murdered he is arrested for it.
Episode 21
The People vs. Matlock
Tue, Mar 24, 198748 mins
Gerald O'Hara is accused of killing Dan Keaton, a candidate in the current election, by gunfire and dumping the body at a construction site. Juror # 7 Harry Craven accuses Ben of bribing a witness with cash mailed from Ben's office.
Episode 22
The Photographer
Tue, Mar 31, 198748 mins
A crooked photographer is murdered.
Episode 23
The Reporter
Tue, May 5, 198748 mins
When a house blows up and a body is found which appears to be that of the owner. The police investigate and think that the man's wife is a suspect. When she is arrested, a reporter tells Ben about her and when he offers to defend her, the reporter hopes to get a story. When they look into the man's background, they discover a lot of irregularities. And even the neighbor saw some peculiar things on the night of the explosion.
Episode 24
The Doctors
Tue, May 12, 198748 mins
Habitually angry Dr Dave Westlake supervises a team of doctors and threatens them with bad performance reviews before being killed. Team member Bruce Jacobs finds the body and they all become suspects.
