Frank Pembleton quotes from Homicide: Life on the Street

Russert

Frank, how are the flowers coming?

Pembleton

What?

Russert

Flowers, flowers.

Pembleton

The lilies have landed.

Bayliss

Can I come?

Pembleton

Come where?

Bayliss

See the baby.

Pembleton

You've seen the baby.

Bayliss

I know, but I love babies.

Pembleton

Then have one of your own.

Bayliss

Hey Frank, remember when I said that I've never been invited to your house. I wanna come to your house, Frank.

Pembleton

No, not tonight.

Bayliss

I'll call your wife. Your wife will let me come over. Your wife likes me.

Pembleton

God knows why.

Bayliss

I'll meet you in the garage.

Pembleton

Oh, happy day.

Bayliss

Yeah, see when I saw that, I knew she would love it.

Pembleton

She's two weeks old, Bayliss. She doesn't know what she loves.

Bayliss

Sure, she does. Hey, Olivia, you like uncle Timmy, don't you? Yeah?

Pembleton

Uncle Timmy?

Bayliss

What?

Pembleton

Talking to babies in that goo-goo voice, like they're understanding. I hate that. I hate it.

Bayliss

Geez, Frank. What must you think when you look into this crib and see that face?

Pembleton

I see - Mary and me, struggling with two salaries to make sure Olivia goes to college. I see - me going ballistic because she comes in after curfew. I see - a guy, just like you, coming to my front door, saying I'm gonna marry your daughter.

Pembleton

[Holding coffee pot] Who-who finished the last of the...uh...bagel?

Lewis

Bagel?

Pembleton

Bagel. Bagel. BAY-GUL! Hot. Brown. Liquid? Bagel.

Lewis

Oh, sure. Bagel.

Kellerman

You mean "coffee," Frank.

Pembleton

Th-that's what I said, isn't it?

Kellerman

Right, uh, the bagel.

Pembleton

[yelling] Who finished the last of the bagel, huh?

Lewis

[quietly] Kellerman.

Pembleton

[to Kellerman] You-you-you make the next pot, huh?

Pembleton

It's okay. I know. I talk funny. I walk funny. I'm a little bit slow. But I still know this job. Me and you. We can find this guy.

Bayliss

Frank, go home.

Pembleton

You don't think I'm good enough to be your partner, do you?

Bayliss

That's not true.

Pembleton

I'm the same man. I'm the same man. You don't think I'm the same man, do you? You think I'm never gonna be the same? You kiss my ass.

Bayliss

You know, this isn't easy for me either. Everything's all switched around. I'm not usually the one who's driving, Frank; you are. And I'm not used to looking at the right side of your face, I'm used to looking at the left side.

Pembleton

[turning to the side] How's this? Now you can look at the back side of my face.

Bayliss

You know, I'm tough with you, you hate me. I'm nice to you, you hate me.

Pembleton

I had the stroke; I almost died. I'm supposed to be a different person, huh? I'm supposed to treat people better?

Bayliss

I'm not people; I'm your partner.

Pembleton

Oh, you're my partner. I sit at a desk. I am of absolutely no use to you and I'm your partner. I watch my weight. I watch my diet. I watch my blood pressure. Every 8 hours, no matter where I am, or what I'm doing, I hafta take a little white pill. If I don't follow the rules, I die. I'm not going to treat you differently. I won't. 'Cause that's not who I am. And who I am is all I have left.

Bayliss

You're looking good there, Frank. You're looking sure. Everyday, you're looking a little more sure. Not taking your medicine, are you? I'm a detective, Frank. A keen observer of the human condition. I pick up on the subtlest clues, I react to the slightest suggestion. In short, I deduce.

Pembleton

Who told you?

Bayliss

Brodie. You gotta take your medicine, Frank. If you don't take your pills Frank, your head's gonna explode.

Pembleton

What I gotta do is pass this test. I pass, I'm a detective. I fail, I'm office furniture.

Bayliss

I hear you passed your firearms exam; that is the best news.

Pembleton

Well, not for you.

Bayliss

What do you mean?

Pembleton

The good times are over. The easy times. I'm back; I'm rested. I'm.... meaner than ever.

Giardello

Hey, in this unit, Danvers is tu familia, cappice? I want you to take every word out of his mouth seriously. I want you to investigate every single lead, Frank. And if that's a problem with you, I can give this investigation over to Bayliss and he can handle it. Now, down the line, I want to be able to look Danvers in the eye.

Pembleton

Trust me, you will.

Brodie

The rights of the suspect. Give me your thoughts.

Pembleton

You are a citizen of a free nation. Having lived your adult life in a land of guaranteed civil liberties, you commit a crime of violence, whereupon you are jacked up, dragged down to Police Headquarters and deposited in a claustrophobic anteroom containing three chairs, a table, and cold brick walls. Have a seat, please. And there you sit for a half hour or more until a homicide detective, a man who can in no way be mistaken for a friend, enters the room. He offers you a cigarette, not your brand, and begins an uninterrupted monologue which wanders back and forth for a half hour or so, eventually coming to rest in a familiar place: you have the right to remain silent.

Bayliss

You have got the absolute right to remain silent!

Pembleton

Of course you do. You're a criminal. Criminals always have the right to remain silent.

Lewis

We're talking about sacred freedoms here, notably your Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination. Hey, if it was good enough for Ollie North and Mark Fuhrman, who the hell are you to incriminate yourself at the first opportunity?

Munch

Get it straight, a police detective paid government money to put you in prison is explaining your absolute right to shut up before you say anything stupid.

Brodie

What are you focusing on when you first sit down with a suspect?

Pembleton

The detective has informed you of your rights. He wants you to be protected, he says. Because, he says, there's nothing that concerns him more than giving you every possible assistance in this very confusing and stressful moment in your life.

Howard

The detective wants you to know, and we've been doing this a lot longer than you have, so you can take our word for it. Your rights to counsel aren't all they're cracked up to be.

Pembleton

Once you actually up and call for that lawyer, son, there ain't a damn thing we can do for you. No, sir, your good friends in the Homicide Unit are gonna have to lock you all alone in this room. And the next authority figure to scan your case will be a no-nonsense prosecutor from the Violent Crimes Unit, with the official title "Assistant State's Attorney for the City of Baltimore."

Munch

And God help you then, because a ruthless blood-sucker like that'll have an O'Donnell Heights motorhead like yourself halfway to the gas chamber before you get three words out.

Kellerman

Your best bet is to speak up. Speak up now.

Giardello

You and Detective Stivers.

Lewis

Gee, Detective Stivers and I were having a meeting. We were trying to figure out a way to get Luther Mahoney off the streets once and for all.

Pembleton

It doesn't look like a business meeting.

Lewis

There are business meetings and then there's -- there's business meetings.

Munch

Word to the wise, Meldrick? Nix the horizontal rumba with a fellow detective. Don't dip your wick in the company ink.

Lewis

I wasn't. [to Brodie] Why you want to film that?