The BEST episodes of The First 48
Every episode of The First 48 ever, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of The First 48!
Follows detectives during the hours immediately following a homicide.
#1 - The Devil You Know
Season 21 - Episode 45 - Aired 3/25/2021
Mobile Homicide tracks a killer who shot a man in his home, but they learn not everything is what it seems.
Watch Now:Amazon#2 - Thick as Thieves
Season 21 - Episode 46 - Aired 4/1/2021
In Mobile, Detective Jermaine Rogers hunts for multiple perpetrators of a home invasion that left two dead.
Watch Now:Amazon#3 - Down and Out / Room for the Night
Season 17 - Episode 29 - Aired 8/4/2016
Detective Rob Barrere investigates when three men meet in a motel room in New Orleans east, and one of them ends up dead; while in Tulsa, Detective Ronnie Leatherman catches the case of a man stabbed 21 times when a night of drinking ignites a murderous rage.
Watch Now:Amazon
#4 - Deadly Gamble/Inside Job
Season 9 - Episode 18 - Aired 7/15/2010
Harris County/Miami - Dep. Mario Quintanilla investigates the murder of a woman shot during a robbery of her illegal game room. Acting on a tip that his suspects are from Central America, Quintanilla races to find them before they can flee the country. And in Miami, Det. Fabio Sanchez heads to Little Haiti to investigate the homicide of two young men shot in their living room. Sanchez must track down a friend of the victims, who was with them before they were shot, to find out what he knows.
#5 - Desert Bones / Party's Over
Season 1 - Episode 9 - Aired 8/19/2004
Detectives Dillian and Jewell join forensic anthropologist Laura Fulginiti to determine the identity of a female skeleton found in the desert. And the shooting of a teenager at a high-school party puts Detectives Rodriguez and Kulesa on the trail of a shooter wearing a ski mask.
Watch Now:Amazon#6 - Triggered
Season 21 - Episode 12 - Aired 2/27/2020
Detective Ronnie Leatherman returns to Tulsa homicide to investigate the death of a man who crashed his car in a shopping center.
Watch Now:Amazon
#7 - Lester Street
Season 7 - Episode 6 - Aired 7/17/2008
Four adults and two children lay dead in was is being called the worst mass murder in 15 years. Detectives scramble for clues and learn the deaths may be gang related. Can detectives locate these killers for before they take anyone else out?
Watch Now:AmazoniTunes#8 - Hit List/Hand in Hand
Season 11 - Episode 11 - Aired 8/25/2011
In Miami, lead detective TC Cepero investigates the murder of a 20-year-old male, gunned down in the middle of the street in broad daylight. With surveillance video of the suspect and possible witnesses they learn the victim may have been on the killers hit list. Then, in DeKalb County, a 20-year-old man is shot dead while walking his girlfriend home at night. Sergeant Matthew Ferreira and team must work quickly to solve this senseless murder that also left two others injured.
Watch Now:iTunes
#9 - Best Laid Plans/Burned Alive
Season 13 - Episode 16 - Aired 5/30/2013
In Cleveland, when a teenager is shot down in the street, detectives discover his best friends may have something to do with the murder. In Harris County, a young woman set on fire clings to life as deputies race to find who left her for dead.
Watch Now:iTunes#10 - After Hours/The Cutting Edge
Season 20 - Episode 10 - Aired 2/28/2019
In Atlanta, a stranger guns down a new father in a parking lot; in Georgia's Gwinnett County, a man is stabbed more than 20 times when someone he trusts turns against him.
#11 - Caught in the Middle
Season 11 - Episode 16 - Aired 10/27/2011
In Miami, two men are found beaten and shot behind an abandoned house. As Det. TC Cepero digs deeper into the case he unearths more than one reason the men could have been killed.
Watch Now:Amazon
#13 - Nightmare in Greedy Grove/Good Man Down
Season 13 - Episode 3 - Aired 12/6/2012
A drive-by shooting in Dallas leads to the death of an innocent bystander; a young Cleveland father is killed as he attempts to break up a fight.
Watch Now:iTunes
#14 - Easy Money/Ambushed
Season 13 - Episode 11 - Aired 4/11/2013
In Dallas a young father is shot in the back, but no one wants to talk. Then in Cleveland a brazen corner store stickup leaves an innocent clerk dead
Watch Now:iTunes
#15 - Smoke Screen/The Last Goodbye
Season 9 - Episode 6 - Aired 3/4/2010
A 28-year-old father is stabbed to death while at work; a 35-year-old man is shot to death in a bar bathroom.
Watch Now:iTunes
#16 - Into the Graveyard
Season 13 - Episode 13 - Aired 4/25/2013
In Miami, a family is shattered when two teenage brothers are gunned down in their own backyard. Two surviving friends point Detective TC Cepero and his team in the direction of two desperate and dangerous gunmen on the run. But Cepero will need the community's help to get the brazen killers off the street.
Watch Now:AmazoniTunes
#17 - Fatal Pickup/Bad Neighbor
Season 5 - Episode 2 - Aired 1/18/2007
A sixty-one year old man becomes an unlikely suspect when a double shooting takes place. Investigators try to wrap their brains around the tragic murders and the unlikely suspect. A murder victim is found dumped in a park their body full of bullets. As detectives dig deeper into the life of the victim they start to unravel man secrets.
Watch Now:iTunes#18 - Brother's Keeper/Fighting Words
Season 14 - Episode 6 - Aired 10/17/2013
In Cleveland, an innocent man is gunned down in a gang war and Detectives race to find his killers before any more blood is shed. Then, in Dallas, a father is murdered close to home and detectives need his neighbors to give them a lead.
Watch Now:iTunes#19 - Murder in the Driveway/Double Shooting in the Beans
Season 2 - Episode 12 - Aired 7/21/2005
In a case of young man shot dead in Little Haiti, Miami Detective Ervens Ford and his team learn the suspected killer is a member of a notorious gang. The team must hunt him down, before he flees the country. And when two teenagers are brutually gunned down in the Pork-n-Beans project, Sgt. Pepi Granado and Det. Freddy Ponce learn there's a witness who saw the murders go down. To solve the case, they must get the witness to reveal what he knows.
Watch Now:iTunes
#21 - Blood on the Streets
Season 12 - Episode 22 - Aired 10/4/2012
Miami homicide detectives investigating a triple shooting on a crowded bus learn the violence was the result of an escalating street war.
Watch Now:Amazon#22 - Hostile Takeover/Shot in the Back
Season 2 - Episode 3 - Aired 1/20/2005
In Miami, a young man's body is found next to a high-rise, a victim of an apparent suicide. But the investigation takes a twist when Sgt. Joe Schillaci discovers signs of a struggle on the victim's body. The man was seen with a mysterious woman only hours before his death--but the woman has disappeared. Is she the killer--or yet another victim? Detectives in Dallas find two burned up bodies in opposite sides of town on the same night. The investigation leads to a motel where they find a bloody room and the possible murder scene. Were the two victims killed by the same killer?
Watch Now:iTunes
#23 - Torn/Gun Crazy
Season 8 - Episode 21 - Aired 8/11/2009
A love triangle turns deadly, and detectives work to untangle the web. Gun fire erupts in a car leaving one man dead and another injured.
#24 - A Serial Killer Calls
Season 2 - Episode 1 - Aired 1/6/2005
Homicide detectives led by Sgt. Doug Niemeier are drawn into a deadly cat-and-mouse game with a serial killer who calls 911 to direct them to bodies he's hidden around Kansas City. Niemeier and his team must race against time to stop the elusive killer before he kills again.
Watch Now:AmazoniTunes
#25 - John Doe/Night of the Dead
Season 9 - Episode 17 - Aired 7/8/2010
In Louisville, two detectives are hoping to solve the murder of an unidentified man.
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