‘Law & Order’

The main reason for the success of “Law & Order” is its relentlessly PC plot lines (“How ‘Law & Order’ Rewrote the Rules,” by Brian Lowry, May 18). I never saw prosecutors so loath to do their jobs. They go weepy any time they have to consider the death penalty. It’s diverse, but the only places you’ll find minorities here are as judges, lawyers, police captains, doctors and professors. They are conspicuously rare in only one role -- as criminals.

The typical episode goes something like this: Two people stumble on a dead body and Lenny and partner are summoned to the scene. They question the few obligatory minority suspects but they are cleared when they discover the real perpetrator -- an obnoxious, rich, white Republican male. They have an airtight case but the snotty defense lawyer always gets the most damning piece of evidence excluded, forcing Lenny and partner to find more, which they always do.

Sometimes McCoy and company get the “perp” to cut a deal by threatening “the needle,” an empty threat since the last time anyone was executed in New York state was in 1963. In the end, a conviction is won and the prosecutors pat themselves on the back over drinks for getting another white millionaire thug off the streets.

Judd Silver

Irvine

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While not diminishing the talent of Dick Wolf and his writers, I can’t help thinking that at least part of his inspiration was a ‘60s TV series called “Arrest and Trial” in which the first half dealt with the arrest and the second half with the trial. Sound familiar?

Jim Makichuk

Sherman Oaks