There are few actors so closely tied to a persona than Raymond Burr as Perry Mason. This long-running series was built upon Erle Stanley Gardner´s many novels about a brilliant defense lawyer and his staff, that solved many a crime with surprise witnesses and stern cross-examinations.It was the first mystery series to feature chalk or tape outlines to mark the spots where bodies were found. Filmed almost exclusively in the Los Angeles area, Raymond Burr had Gardner's seal of approval in the role. The cases were usually won by way of pivotal confessions of witnesses, solicited by Perry Mason (Burr's) surgeon-like examination or with last-minute, key evidence brought into the courtroom by private investigator, Paul Drake (William Hopper). Della Street (Barbara Hale), Perry´s faithful secretary, was always at Perry's side in the courtroom where hapless Hamilton Burger (William Tallman) was the Los Angeles District Attorney who never seemed to win. As to the myth that Perry Mason never lost, there were 2 episodes where it did occur... but you'll have to watch to find out.The show was revived in 1973-74, with other actors in the familiar roles (Monte Markham as Mason), and then again with the some of the original cast, in a string of feature length TV films from 1985 until Raymond Burr´s death in 1993.
Perry has all kinds of troubles in this one when a murder brings him into the tangled financial and personal affairs of the wealthy Balfour family.
Gossip columnist Mary K. Davis is found murdered and it seems there is no shortage of suspects. There was her politician-husband to whom she refused to grant a divorce. There was her timid secretary whom she bullied. There was the secretary's boyfriend who had some secrets in his past. There was the doctor running an illegal baby-selling scheme whom Mary threatened to expose if he didn't give her a child. Leona Walsh, the doctor's nurse, ends up being charged with the crime and this time Perry has to tamper with some evidence in order to clear his client.
Retired general Roger Brandon is set to head an anti-crime commission to investigate racketeering in a notoriously corrupt town. Rackets boss George Emory claims to have compromising photos of Brandon's young wife, Laura. Emory threatens to launch a smear campaign against Laura unless Brandon refuses the assignment. Brandon calls Emory's bluff and accepts the assignment but then Emory turns up murdered. Guess who gets charged with the crime?
Author Mauvis Meade sends her secretary, Gladys Doyle, out to a mountain cabin to pick up a package. Gladys gets lost and her car gets stuck in the mud. She then walks to a cabin looking for help and encounters a mysterious man who appears to know her. While Gladys freshens up, the man leaves and Gladys discovers a dead body.
While Martha Bradford is waiting for her appointment at a beauty parlour, she meets Rita Bradford who apparently is also married to Joe Bradford and lives at the same address. Joe Bradford is preparing for a business meeting in San Diego. He makes plans to meet his wife Martha but fails to show up. Joe Bradford is found dead on his boat the next morning and Martha Bradford is accused of his murder when her fingerprints are found on a candle located on the boat.
Mitsuo Kamuri has been seeing a great deal of Grover Nichols, son of wealthy businessman Hudson Nichols. Nichols doesn't approve of his son's relationship and when Mitsuo is "caught" with a string of valuable pearls belonging to Mrs. Nichols he agrees to drop all charges provided she stops seeing his son. Things then get even more complicated when Mitsuo's uncle, who had originally strung the pearls. is found murdered. The death has been made to look like hara-kiri but the police are not fooled.
Richard Vanaman is up for a promotion at his investment firm but is sabotaged and framed for murder.
Wealthy rancher John Brant forecloses on Jo Ann Blanchard's mortgage and takes possession of her prized stallion. Jo Ann goes to Perry for help in getting the horse back but soon needs Perry's aid in getting her off a murder charge she is arrested for killing Brant.
When wealthy Louise Gordon is poisoned to death her nurse is charged with the crime. Perry does some digging and discovers that the first wife of the victim's husband also died of poisoning. Is the husband really the culprit or could it be someone else?
This is the episode where Della asks Perry how far he would go for a friend and then asks for $25,000. Della needs the money for her friend Janet Brent, who is being blackmailed. Edward Franklin, an employee of Janet's husband, has staged compromising photos of her in a motel. At a party, Janet confronts Franklin and hits him with a small statue of a ""weary watchdog."" The police arrest Della when they find her driving Janet's car from the scene of the argument. Franklin is dead, struck three times on the head with the statue. Janet claims she only hit him once and Perry believes her. Perry takes the case knowing that if he loses, Della will go to prison as an accessory. There is a surprise in the plot, when a Red Chinese slave market is uncovered.
When Daniel Reed (Edgar Stehli) finds himself being blackmailed by an old business partner from his time in Alaska, Perry must first save him from the insane asylum and then the gas chamber. Convinced that Reed has lost his mind when he begins writing $20,000.00 checks to strangers, his heartless niece and nephew have the old man forcibly placed in an insane asylum. Perry is enlisted by Reed’s girlfriend Millie Foster (Kitty Kelly) to get him out of the asylum and he is no sooner granted his freedom than his blackmailer turns up dead and Reed stands accused of his murder.
Perry returns to his office late one night and finds an attractive woman climbing into his balcony window. She claims to be Virginia Colfax, the secretary of Ed Garvin who has an office next door to Perry's. Ms. Colfax says that she climbed into Perry's office in order to escape from Garvin's hot tempered wife but Perry later learns that Garvin is married to two women. Garvin and second wife Lorrie are sent to Mexico by Perry until he can clear up the matter but when Garvin's first wife, Ethel, is murdered there's an even bigger mess on the scene. And just who in the world is Virginia Colfax, the woman climbing in the window?
A mixed up mess awaits Perry as he struggles to put all the pieces together. Blackmail, murder, a boyfriend who spent the night, all add up to one great case.
DA Hamilton Burger asks Perry to defend an old friend who once saved his life in a boating accident ten years before. The old friend of Burger's is now facing a murder charge.
A building contractor is charged with the murder of a wealthy political Mr.fix-it.
Restrauteur Morey Allen, a friend of Perry and Della's, has a problem: his waitress, Dixie Dayton, was struck by a car while fleeing the restaurant after spotting a man stalking her. The only item she left behind was a moth-eaten mink. When the stalker is found murdered, Morey and Dixie are both strong suspects and eventually get arrested for the murder. The case also ties in with the murder of a young policeman several months before.
A journalist is murdered while tracking an ex-Nazi war criminal who may be posing as an executive at a company called Space Associates, Ltd.
Claire Olger is hitchhiking because her purse was stolen at the bus station and is picked up by Michael Greeley. He loses control of the car and has an accident due to his being intoxicated. Arriving at the scene of the accident, the police find Claire in the driver's seat. The district attorney's office questions her but do not believe her story about another driver. Her friend, Doris Stephanak, asks Perry Mason to help. When Perry is unable to contact Claire at her hotel, he goes there and finds Michael Greeley dead in her room. The police accuse Claire Olger of murder, realizing Michael Greeley fits the description of the man she claimed was driving the car and believe she had motive and opportunity.
When Albert Sanders is charged with the murder of Kim Lane, Perry offers to defend him free of charge because he knows Sanders is still devastated over the accidental death of his wife and children eight years before. The solution to the case hinges on a heroin smuggling ring operating out of a dance hall. Writer: Al C. W
A judge is accused of murdering a government witness who planned to expose him as a crook. The question though, is is he a crook.
18 year-old Trudy's mother has died leaving her $10 million and suddenly men claiming to be her long-lost father are coming into town. The only one who could identify the real father, a blind uncle, is killed, but by who?
A double cross, a double murder, a plane crash, missing money, and yet another innocent widow charged with crimes she didn't commit are the elements of this case.
Ruth Prescott wants to divorce Walter Prescott so that she can be with her true love, Jimmy MacLaine. After a brush with death, Ruth becomes convinced that Walter is trying to kill her rather than give her the divorce. Walter then turns up dead and the police are convinced that Ruth shot him but Perry, as usual, doesn't think so. A lame canary and unusual bruises on the victim hold the keys to the puzzle.
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