The milestone 25th season of COPS premieres Saturday, Dec. 15 (8:00-8:30 PM ET/PT) on FOX, during which the veteran show will go on duty in Toledo, OH; Sacramento, CA; and Portland, OR. The following week on Saturday, Dec. 22 (8:00-8:30 PM ET/PT), COPS will debut another unforgettable edition of the annual special, “Ho! Ho! Ho!” highlighting Portland, OR; Alameda County, CA; and Las Vegas, NV. The trailblazing show remains one of the longest-running primetime series currently airing on broadcast television and will celebrate its landmark 850th episode in February.
This season, the Emmy Award-nominated reality series will cover the U.S. from coast to coast and profile some of the country’s finest law enforcement professionals and more interesting suspects. COPS will film with police and sheriff’s departments in California, Florida, New Jersey, Ohio and Virginia. The show also will revisit Kansas City, MO; Sacramento, CA; and Broward County, FL, where the original pilot was filmed.
For nearly a quarter-century, COPS has followed law enforcement agencies in more than 140 U.S. cities and has filmed in Europe, Asia and Central and South America. It was the first American television program to follow police in the former Soviet Union. A true pioneer of the reality television phenomenon, creator and executive producer John Langley is often credited with introducing the signature “video vérite” style of COPS, a camera technique that notably influenced TV advertising, news reporting and other network and syndicated programming.