The veteran drama continues its 14th series. In this week’s episode, a Japanese businessman is accused of inflaming racial prejudice in a bid to cover up the assassination of his wife. As the man’s guilt becomes clear, Branch uses trickery to lure him back to New York to stand trial.

The national press has a field day when a visiting Japanese businessman and his celebrity wife are attacked by an armed robber in New York’s financial district. Hiroji Yoshida is shot in the arm and his wife is killed. The businessman claims a black man driving a red van is the culprit, prompting Detectives Briscoe and Green to canvass the area for leads.

The cops’ inquiries lead them to a potential suspect, but Mr Yoshida is unable to pick him out of a line-up. The businessman returns home to Japan, where he uses the media to launch a stinging attack on New York’s violent culture. Under renewed pressure to solve the crime, the detectives turn their attention to a Lexus car that was seen speeding away from the scene.

It transpires that the vehicle in question was driven by Bobby Ito, a Japanese-American youth with connections to the yakuza, Japan’s notorious tattooed gangsters. It now seems likely that Yoshida invented a fictitious black assailant because he was too scared to point the finger at the real killers – the yakuza. “He’s certainly not going to testify against them,” Briscoe says. “I don’t think they have witness protection in Japan.”

Bobby Ito is arrested in possession of a gun matching the murder weapon, but he refuses to say why the yakuza might want Yoshida and his wife dead until McCoy offers him a deal. Ito’s lawyer then stuns the prosecutors with a shocking revelation: “Hiroji Yoshida paid my client to murder his wife.”

Ito claims that, two days before the murder, he met Yoshida in a diner where the businessman hired him to kill his wife. This story is backed up by a waitress who witnessed Yoshida handing Ito a photo of Mrs Yoshida. “I saw him take a woman’s picture out of his wallet and show it to the other Japanese guy,” she tells Southerlyn. It becomes apparent that Yoshida wanted to cash in on his wife’s $3 million life insurance policy in order to pay off gambling debts he owed the yakuza.

Unfortunately, the Japanese authorities are reluctant to extradite Yoshida to the US for trial. “What this man did is outrageous,” fumes Branch. “He picks our city – my city – to murder his wife, then he turns it around and blames it on us!” The wily DA hatches a plan to lure the businessman back to New York by telling the press that police have detained a suspect matching his description of a black assailant – and they need Yoshida’s help to identify him.

As a popular figure in Japan, Yoshida cannot be seen to refuse the invitation to assist with the investigation, but Branch’s tactics alarm Van Buren and McCoy, who feel that by using the pretence of a black culprit, the DA is adding to racial tensions. Yoshida duly returns to New York and is arrested – but his case proves to be anything but straightforward.

The defence wants to exclude African Americans from the jury on the grounds that they are biased against the defendant for trying to blame a black person. “The fundamental question is, can my client receive a fair trial from jurors whose prejudices have been inflamed by the media coverage of this case?” the defence lawyer asks. Once the judge agrees to the defence’s request, the trial can get underway – but does McCoy have enough evidence to secure Yoshida’s conviction?