22 Rifle for Christmas

Originally Aired: December 21, 1950 Dragnet #80, "22 Rifle for Christmas," Sergeant Joe Friday and his partner Ben Romero respond to what begins as a routine missing child case but quickly becomes something far more sinister. When nine-year-old Stanley Johnstone disappears from his backyard on a cold December afternoon just days before Christmas, his mother Ruth initially believes he has simply run away from home as he once did before. However, when juvenile detectives Harry Levinson and his partner discover fresh blood stains in the backyard along with an empty .22 caliber shell casing, Friday and Romero realize they may be dealing with something much darker than a runaway child. As Lieutenant Lee Jones from the crime lab analyzes the blood evidence and a special detail is called in to aid the search, Friday questions Mrs. Johnstone about her son's habits and whereabouts. The investigation intensifies as the hours tick by with no sign of Stanley. With blood evidence mounting and the boy missing for over four hours in the pre-Christmas cold, Friday faces a race against time to discover what happened in that backyard and locate the missing child before it's too late.