LAPD: Life on the Beat

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Overview

LAPD: Life on the Beat, was an American reality television series about the Los Angeles Police Department that aired in syndication from 1995-1999,. Like its contemporary, COPS, LAPD followed police officers on patrol and during investigations, however unlike COPS, Life on the Beat only featured police officers from the Los Angeles Police Department. Originally the series aired as just LAPD in 1995, it wasn't till 1996 when the show really took off and had better graphics and so forth that the name was changed to LAPD: Life on the Beat. A typical episode featured four segments, a cold case story and usually a quiz relating to police statistics. Unlike COPS, Life on the Beat featured incidental music and a narrator. At the time of the series, the LAPD still had only 18 stations, so camera crews would cover as many stations as possible and had episodes featuring multiple areas of Los Angeles. Episodes featured routine patrol, vice units, gang units, and even SWAT calls. Many segments also featured the Air Support Division. For a large amount of Patrol based segments, cameras would flip back and forth between ground and aerial angles.