The Best Lieutenant Cedric Daniels Quotes

Lt. Cedric Daniels: I don't care how you do it, but I need my wire today.

Lt. Cedric Daniels: Lt. Cedric Daniels: Couple weeks from now, you're gonna be in some district somewhere with 11 or 12 uniforms looking to you for everything. And some of them are gonna be good police. Some of them are gonna be young and stupid. A few are gonna be pieces of shit. But all of them will take their cue from you. You show loyalty, they learn loyalty. You show them it's about the work, it'll be about the work. You show them some other kinda game, then that's the game they'll play. I came on in the Eastern, and there was a piece-of-shit lieutenant hoping to be a captain, piece-of-shit sergeants hoping to be lieutenants. Pretty soon we had piece-of-shit patrolmen trying to figure the job for themselves. And some of what happens then is hard as hell to live down. Comes a day you're gonna have to decide whether it's about you or about the work.

[last lines]
Lt. Cedric Daniels: The murder warrant's on hold. The deputy gave us another month. Also, whoever that was you brought in here today gave himself up as an eyewitness in the Gant murder.
Det. James 'Jimmy' McNulty: Who, Omar?
Lt. Cedric Daniels: And Greggs said to tell you she'd write it up in the morning.
Det. James 'Jimmy' McNulty: Lieutenant - thanks.
[McNulty leaves]
Det. Lester Freamon: It cost you?
[Daniels says nothing]

Det. Roland 'Prez' Pryzbylewski: OK, on that burner? I called Trac, gave them the serial number. Trac Corporation told me they sent it to Northland, a purchasing corporation. Northland tells me they sent it to their distribution center in Hagerstown. Hagerstown tells me they sent it to Buddy's Mondo Mart at 1440 Propane Road, Falls Church, Va. That's where it went out into the street.
[pause]
Det. Roland 'Prez' Pryzbylewski: What?
Lt. Cedric Daniels: Did Buddy have them on display to the left or the right of the cash register?
Det. Roland 'Prez' Pryzbylewski: How would I know that?

Lt. Cedric Daniels: You rather live in shit than the world see you work a shovel.

Lt. Cedric Daniels: [leaving Burrell's office] Dope on the damn table.

Lt. Cedric Daniels: I'll tell you the truth Major. Everyone who saw the punch wrote on it. And they've all got Prez throwing the punch, no question. They've also got you addressing a subordinate officer as, what was it? A shit-bird?
Maj. Stanislaus Valchek: Fuck you. This is the Baltimore Police Department, not the Roland Park Ladies Tea.

Lt. Cedric Daniels: You know what I love? The mind that's always a step ahead of me. The person who never stops thinking it through. That's what I fell in love with first.
Marla: You know what I fell in love with first? Do you? Your ambition. Where did that man go?

Lt. Cedric Daniels: Major, I'm asking as a favor.
Maj. William A. Rawls: As a favor?
Lt. Cedric Daniels: Yes, sir. A favor.
Maj. William A. Rawls: In that case... no!

Acting Commissioner Ervin H. Burrell: [about Proposition Joe's gang] What makes you think they'll promote the wrong man?
Lt. Cedric Daniels: We do it all the time.

Asst. State's Atty. Rhonda Pearlman: The fact is, the industry has all of us by the balls.
[pause]
Asst. State's Atty. Rhonda Pearlman: Pardon my French, your honor.
Judge: All right, I'll tell you what. Best I can do for you is this: You give me a boilerplate affidavit with the PC from the court report. And then, as you get fresh numbers for the new disposables, you call me - anytime, day or night - to jump phones.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: That helps. But we're still gonna be getting up on their phones even as they're coming down.
Judge: Yeah, probably so.
Asst. State's Atty. Rhonda Pearlman: This is so totally...
Judge: Fucked up. Je parle français bien, et tu, hein, tu es charmante aujourd'hui.

Lt. Cedric Daniels: What're you doing here at two in the morning?
Det. Ellis Carver: Field interviews. Police work.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: "Police work." I got a 14-year-old kid in critical but stable condition at University and two witnesses who say one of you princes cold-cocked him with the butt end of a pistol.
Det. Thomas 'Herc' Hauk: No sir.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: I got his mother over at I.I.D. filing a formal brutality charge, which for Herc will make an even four in the last two years!
Det. Thomas 'Herc' Hauk: Unsustained...
Lt. Cedric Daniels: But all of 'em true!
Det. Thomas 'Herc' Hauk: Lieutenant, we thought that...
Lt. Cedric Daniels: I got one less Crown Vic than I had last night, I'm out two Kevlar vests that burned in the car, two hand-held radios, a shotgun and I'm about to lose this idiot here for a week or two of medical! And for WHAT?
Det. Ellis Carver: Lieutenant, we thought...
Lt. Cedric Daniels: What did you learn when you went into the Terrace at two in the morning to conduct field interviews? What valuable information did we acquire from this situation? I.I.D. is gonna be on all three of you by afternoon. If you don't get a story straight by then, you're gonna have a file thick enough to see the light of a trial board. Now, tell me, who cold-cocked the kid?
Det. Roland 'Prez' Pryzbylewski: [after several seconds of silence] Me.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: [intensely] Why?
Det. Roland 'Prez' Pryzbylewski: He pissed me off.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: No, Officer Pryzbylewski, he did NOT piss you off. He made you fear for your safety and that of your fellow officers.

Dep. Comm. for Operations William A. Rawls: If they work for me, they need my OK. Good news is I got no problem with anyone on your list. Except McNulty. No McNulty. Nothing that even resembles the son-of-a-bitch.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: That bad, huh?
Dep. Comm. for Operations William A. Rawls: He quits or he drowns. That's the only two things getting him off the fucking boat so help me God.

Det. James 'Jimmy' McNulty: I'm not going.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: You're insubordinate?
Det. James 'Jimmy' McNulty: I'm not jumping out on something I believe's going to harm the case. You want to write me up on that, you can.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: You think I want this? I got the Deputy Ops on my ass for this shit! Now I got you showing me up in front of the whole damn detail!
Det. James 'Jimmy' McNulty: I don't mean to show anyone up.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: Get your vest on.
Det. James 'Jimmy' McNulty: No. I've got police work to do.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: Motherfucker, if you felt this way, why didn't you call in sick?
Det. James 'Jimmy' McNulty: I'm not sick.
Lt. Cedric Daniels: [whispering] Yeah you are.

Lt. Cedric Daniels: [to Burrell] If you'd wanted to do me, I'd already be done. But there ain't nothing you fear more than a bad headline, is there? You'd rather live in shit than let the world see you work a shovel.