TV REVIEWS : An Ordinary ‘Jury of One’ Still Has Impact

“From the Files of Joseph Wambaugh: Jury of One� (Sunday on Channel 4 at 9 p.m.) is, on one level, a routine morality tale about a guilt-stricken, haggard L.A. cop (the convincing John Spencer) who struggles to live with himself after accidentally killing a fellow officer.

But the Wambaugh touch, the movie’s real impact, is on a purely visual level. As we all know, Wambaugh, who introduces the story by sauntering into LAPD offices and opening up a file cabinet as if he owns the place, didn’t spend 14 years among L.A.’s finest for nothing.

The result is an L.A. crime movie that no one will confuse with “Beverly Hills Cop.� Whether these are Wambaugh’s own personal files is not clear. He dates the file for this yarn from 1987, but Wambaugh was long gone from the ranks by then. In any event, as the first in a possible series of NBC movies supposedly inspired by Wambaugh’s police experiences, “Jury of One� is recommended viewing for its harsh, unremitting look at the squalor of L.A.’s underbelly--notably Pico-Union, Echo Park and East L.A.

By shooting exclusively on the grungy streets fanning out from Parker Center and focusing on Latino gangs, director Alan Metzger and writer David J. Klinghorn catch to some degree the texture of Dennis Hopper’s gang movie “Colors.� Wambaugh’s file, however, makes no effort to dramatize the social dynamic of Latino gangs.

Its aim is elsewhere, on the LAPD boiler room, the grunts who man it and who, after hours, booze and brawl in downtown L.A. bars friendly to cops. All these details are nicely evoked on the run in a story that is otherwise overplotted and, in the case of the Latino murder victims, even confusing.

Meanwhile, anchoring all these remnants is Spencer’s sodden portrait of guilt-racked detective Mike Mulick, a dogged cop on the skids who lives in a broken-down apartment, spies on his estranged wife and only resolves his crisis when he learns--in the story’s moral--to show himself compassion.