Karen Stottlemeyer has decided to film a ""cinema verite"" documentary about her husband's work, but her timing couldn't be worse. The police commissioner shouts at the captain (on camera) for focusing on a routine arson fire in a wig factory and relying on Monk to solve a more newsworthy case involving a female victim whose body was cut up with a chainsaw. Monk is in even worse trouble. After presenting some useful leads involving the chainsaw victim's age and nationality, he accidentally erases several years' worth of crucial computer files, and the enraged commissioner revokes Monk's private practice license despite Stottlemeyer's protests that doing so will destroy him. With Sharona forced to return to her old job as a nurse, the devastated Monk sits in the hospital hallway all day waiting for her until, at her exasperrated insistence, he finds a job with a magazine as a fact checker. Meanwhile, having identified the victim based on Monk's information, the captain and Disher zero i

Monk is summoned to jury duty against his wishes and must solve two crimes: he has to convince the jury the defendent is not guilty, and solve the mystery of a corpse outside the jury room's window.

Monk tries to prove a sports agent is guilty of murder while helping Natalie’s teenage daughter with her love life.

When three homeless men seek Monk's services at the holidays, Natalie convinces him to investigate their friend's death; Stottlemeyer's faith is reawakened after a visit to a monastery fountain rids him of crippling pain.

Natalie tries to throw a surprise party for her surprise-hating boss, who is busy trying to solve the murder of a maintenance man.