Amy hears the case of an extremely abused, mentally ill teenager who has stabbed a teacher; Vincent's agent finds him a publisher who will sign him only if he completes another short story in the next four days; Maxine tries to help an overstressed young mother who is afraid that she will hurt her baby; Lauren strains Amy's patience as she waxes enthusiastically over Michael's girlfriend; Maxine faces a house full of her children for a week as Vincent moves back home to devote all his energies to writing, and Gillian takes a much-needed break from the strain that infertility has placed on her marriage; Vincent's short story inspires Gillian to return home to Peter and reconsider adoption.

Amy must decide if a brain-injured woman is fit to be a mother; Maxine discovers that a teenaged client is being abused by his therapist; Leisha meets Amy, and faces her ire for piercing Lauren's ears without permission; Vincent and Maxine clash over his journalism career; Amy faces a class of insufferable law students when she's asked to teach a seminar at Yale; Donna takes modeling herself after Amy a bit too far when she begins to show up for work dressed and coiffed exactly like her mentor; it's all bark and no bite when Amy decides to dismiss the case of a drug dealer sniffed out by a four-legged member of the neighborhood watch.

Vincent returns to work; Gillian nervously agrees to allow Donna to babysit for Ned so that she and Peter can have a romantic wedding anniversary celebration; Amy takes an instant dislike to Lolly's husband when she accepts an invitation to dinner; after Russell's mother begs him to recall her son's last moments, Vincent pores over the police tapes, struggling to remember; Amy decides the fate of a teenager found guilty of accidentally killing a classmate; Maxine incurs Sean's displeasure when she hands out a condom during the birth control class she volunteers to teach on her own time; Amy is distraught when she realizes that she was greatly mistaken in dismissing a stalking claim as frivolous.

Peter and Gillian lose custody of Ned to Evie; Peter tries to drown his grief in alcohol and is arrested for drunk driving; Gillian fixates on Peter's drinking to avoid dealing with her loss; Amy must rule on the future of an unborn baby after learning that the mother is under investigation for the disappearance of her first child; Maxine and Sadie investigate the strange case of a woman who thinks she's a holly bush; Vincent and Carol attend her parents' 30th wedding anniversary party; Bruce loses his cool when he mediates a dispute over a teenager's plastic surgery.

Amy hears the case of two teenagers accused of causing the suicide of a classmate by deliberately posting lies about her sexual activity on their web site.

The long arm of politics reaches out to Maxine and exacts a heavy penalty for her tirade against the lieutenant governor.

Amy gives her support to Bruce's Gun 101 program.

Vincent returns from his weekend trip and tells Donna that he and Carole flew to Las Vegas and eloped. Carole has already moved on to San Francisco, where Vincent will join her in a few days to be with her during her cancer surgery. Unaware that he hasn't mentioned any of this to his family, Donna lets the news slip to Amy. Amy tries, but fails, to reconcile with her brother. Maxine urges Vincent not to turn away from the love and support that his family is offering which will help him get through this crisis. She tells Amy and Vincent to knock it off and end whatever disagreement is causing them to be estranged from each other.

Amy hears the case of a disturbed teenager who successfully impersonated a police officer at a high school for several months, carrying a loaded gun, and who was only discovered after being arrested for severely beating a student he suspected of being a drug dealer; while Maxine is deciding whether a mother who is being released from prison for killing one of her children should be returned to her family, Kyle helps her uncover some medical information that may give credence to the woman's claim of innocence; Kyle and Brian have a run-in over Kyle's way with Teen Harbor's clients, and Kyle learns an expensive lesson about street kids; as Amy is about to rule in the matter of two teenagers accused of stealing a stop sign and contributing to an accident which seriously injured a man and left him in a coma, she receives word in open court that the man has died, prompting a startling admission from one of the accused; after Lauren walks in on Kyle having sex, Gillian volunteers to help hi

Maxine works more tirelessly than ever on the Pamela Taylor investigation as she assists an attorney in finding other abused teens who are willing to join in the Taylors' class action suit against Buckley Hills; when a social worker in a child abuse case appears in her courtroom with an attitude, and without any of the periodic reports she was ordered to file with the court, Amy cites her for contempt and has her arrested when she discovers that the social worker is unaware of the child's present whereabouts; later that evening at the dinner table, Maxine takes vociferous objection to Amy's ruling and accuses her of displacing her fears and frustration about Maxine's health onto a good social worker who is overworked and overwhelmed; realizing that her mother is right, Amy has the social worker released from jail; when Donna discovers how much Kyle regrets not completing his medical training, she prods him into resuming his studies; Amy presides at the sentencing hearing for two young

Amy must decide if a student raped his teacher or was seduced by her; Kyle is unhappy about his nonmedical duties at St. Michael's; Maxine tries to locate the mother of an abandoned newborn; after Jason menaces Amy while she's driving Lauren and Eric home, Bruce suggests getting a restraining order; fearing the worst about her health, Gillian gets the diagnosis she's dreamed of for years.

After Amy accidently sets on fire the homework that Lauren has spent hours painstakingly hand-calligraphing, she agrees to make it up to her by spending the weekend role-playing at an 18th century inn and inviting Maxine to join them. The going is rougher than she anticipated when they are assigned the roles of kitchen servants. Over a late night fireside heart-to-heart chat, Maxine and Amy share their dislike of change and inability to reconcile conflicting emotions about their place in the world. Bruce pursues Zola after meeting, and being completely unimpressed by, her boyfriend. Kyle treats a 14 year old girl who delivered a baby in a high school bathroom, and cannot get through to the girl's mother, who is unwilling to accept her responsibilites as a parent. Gillian gets an unexpected job offer after spending a long day waiting to interview a new pediatrician. Amy must revoke a custody order after a father reverts to his former abusive ways.

On ""Take Your Daughter to Work Day"", Lauren learns how lucky she is when she spends the afternoon with Maxine, and Rebecca becomes seriously injured after she falls during a seizure; Kyle continues to drink; Stu reassures Amy that she's a permanent part of his life after she fails to make a fabulous first impression during lunch with his opinionated mother; Bruce struggles to get a boy discharged from probation; after begging Lily to rehire Heather, Kyle is shocked when she refuses to return; Heather and Zola let the men in their lives know that they've got romance on their minds.

Amy presides over the case of a prominent athletic star accused of rape. Maxine, feeling the pressure to find a new place to live, considers selling the diner. Kyle tries to locate a kidney for a young patient who needs a transplant. Stu and Amy still can't come to terms on where to go for their honeymoon, with their wedding only a month away.

Maxine takes a chance in placing a young boy about to be released from juvenile detention back with his formerly negligent mother; Amy substitutes for another judge in criminal court and soon realizes that she has a prior relationship with each of the attorneys in the arson case she's been assigned; Kyle and Heather give their relationship another try; Amy buys David a new pair of shoes to replace the ones she ruined, and he asks her out on another date, which goes quite well; after Maxine decides to hire Ignacio to work on their yard, he insists that he needs to know her better before he can create a garden that's perfect for her, and they go out dancing together.

Unwilling to let a poor client go to extremes to get prompt medical attention for her daughter, Maxine finds a way to get D.C.F. to cover the surgery the girl needs; David declares his love for Amy; Maxine gets shocking news about Ignacio and breaks off their relationship; Amy tragically miscalculates a teenager's propensity for violence; increasingly jealous over Peter's involvement with Shelby, Gillian confronts him about the future of their marriage, and doesn't like the response she gets; with the help of Buck and a little gunfire, Kyle finally finds a career path he can get excited about; the Grays receive a very unexpected, and very welcome, visitor.