Troj. Marquis Strickland

Carcetti maps out a damage-control scenario; McNulty asks Landsman to pull police off the homeless case; Haynes' concerns about Templeton fall on deaf ears; Dukie seeks out an old mentor for a loan.

Campbell tries to smooth out the transitions in the police department. The newspaper scrambles to confirm surprising news from City Hall, but lose out to the TV media in scooping a high-profile Grand Jury appearance. As Marlo tries to win favor with the Greeks, Proposition Joe pays his last respects to a fallen colleague, and prepares to make himself scarce in anticipation of a showdown. Freamon enlists the help of a past partner to help with the investigation.

Season Five premiere. As McNulty and the detail continue staking out Marlo's crew, recently promoted Sergeant Carver is welcomed by a cauldron of discontent from officers coping with unpaid overtime. Though he wants to keep his campaign promise to lower crime, Mayor Carcetti is strapped by his commitment to schools, and faces some tough choices. Col Cedric Daniels is forced to reallocate his resources, retaining Freamon and Sydnor for the Clay Davis probe. Meanwhile, City Editor Haynes and the staff of a local newspaper are reeling from corporate cutbacks, losing key personnel from both the metro and international divisions. Still, with the help of reporters Gutierrez, Price and Templeton, Haynes is able to break a front-page story that links a politician to a co-op drug dealer. Proposition Joe, Marlo, Fatface Rick others meet in a hotel conference room to discuss divvying up drug frontiers across East Baltimore's county line.

In the Season Four finale, the bodies from the vacants pile up while Burrell offers his support to Daniels and admonishes Rawls for crossing him. A distraught Bubbles finds himself at his wit's end after his revenge plan backfires. Proposition Joe looks to the Co-op to defray shipment losses, but finds them not so cooperative. Attempting to get Namond off the corners, Colvin visits Cutty in the hospital to arrange a prison sit-down with Wee-Bey about the boy's future. Omar divides the spoils from his latest heist, then hatches an audacious new plan. Carcetti responds to the governor's school-budget offer; Carver tries to buy time for Randy; Dukie has trouble adjusting to his new peers; Marlo gives Michael new responsibilities on an old corner; Colvin and Parenti take their proposal to City Hall; Namond returns to gen pop; and McNulty looks to pay back an old debt he owes Bodie.

Brother Mouzone returns to Baltimore on a mission of revenge and casts a wide net in his search for Omar, who has his own plan for vengeance. Colvin manages, for now, to put off a 'Sun' reporter inquiring about Amsterdam, while Burrell delivers news to City Hall, and the reaction is surprisingly mixed. Carver learns how much he doesn't know about good policing, while Pearlman and Daniels plead their case for a new kind of wiretap to Judge Daniel Phelan. Carcetti is about to launch his campaign, but struggles with its effect on his friendship with Council colleague Tony Gray. Stringer falls out of the loop with Avon and is given an ultimatum by Prop Joe and New Day Co-op crews. Cutty's initial approach to teaching boxing ends up alienating the corner boys, while Marlo raises the stakes against the Barksdale gang. Bubbles provides Freamon with entree into an undercover cell-phone hustle.

Mystified by Omar's disappearance, Marlo and Chris ramp up their efforts to locate their nemesis. After attending a sparsely attended waterfront ceremony, Carcetti fires away at a larger press event--and recasts himself as a champion for the homeless. Bunk revisits some old leads in the rowhouse cases, but is frustrated in his attempts to get bloodwork from the crime lab. Templeton looks for a perfect follow-up to his latest, nationally covered story, which has replaced the city's educational crisis on the paper's priority list. After the detail gets more manpower, Freamon presses McNulty to get new surveillance equipment, but the resources aren't as deep as both hoped. Pearlman discovers new clues pointing to corruption in City Hall; Marlo makes new appointments at the latest co-op meeting; McNulty takes a peculiar interest in a homeless man.