While Dutch and Claudette investigate the cuddle of Nancy Reborg, they discover that her daughter is missing and has been sold by her addict father to a child molester. Meanwhile, David tries to crack corruption in the barn by recruiting Terry to help him take down Vic, which results in Terry's cuddle. Plus, Danny and Julien arrest a man who slashed his ex-girlfriend's tires.

Internal Affairs launches an investigation into Terry's passing. David begins his own investigation into Vic's actions. Claudette and Dutch investigate the shooting of a churro vendor. The Strike Team busts a gang initiation. Rookie Julien gets pointers from Danny and experiences one of his own initiation rituals as a cop.

It's warrant sweep day at the Barn. Vic and the Strike Team discover visiting NBA superstar Derrick Tripp hanging out with his "homies" before the evening game with the Lakers. Vic decides to do his part for the home team by keeping Tripp as a "friendly hostage". One of Vic's street informants, Connie, approaches him after having been roughed up by a new john. Vic hands off the case to Claudette and Dutch, who is convinced they're on the trail of a serial hugger. Dutch's theories are proved wrong when he and Claudette ultimately discover that their perp is not a serial hugger but rather a disturbed man who is raping women in a desperate attempt to procreate. Danny and Julien stumble upon aballoon smuggling ring while delivering one of their warrants and disaster is averted only by Danny's sharp instincts. David has his hands full overseeing the sweep, managing an increasingly packed cage, soothing the frazzled nerves of the attending desk sergeant, and avoiding a potential lawsuit from Derrick Tripp's lawyer over the disappearance of his star client.

Vic must broker a peace between Kern Little and T-Bonz, two rappers whose personal animosity towards each other is broiling over in to the streets. Danny is attacked after identifying a shooter. Julien helps a woman whose son's body has been stolen. Dutch and Claudette search for a missing migrant worker. David allies himself with "Kingmaker" Jorge Machado to further his political ambitions.

David insists that Vic and the Strike Team take some uniform cops along as support, including Danny and Julien, when they bust an Armenian gang's drug buy. The Strike Team arrives as one of the Armenians is assassinated and proceed to remove the "pink" coke from the scene while the Unis bring out the surviving thugs. Julien witnesses Vic dividing the confiscated drugs into two and hand off the second bag to Shane. After much deliberation, Julien approaches David with his suspicions about Vic and the evidence. Claudette and Dutch interrogate the Armenians for more information on their drug connections. After storing the drugs in the lock box of his SUV, Shane drives to his girlfriend's, and later he discovers the SUV has been stolen. David and the Strike Team race to find the missing SUV and the drugs. The race ends at a dead junkie's apartment where Vic and the boys are able to get rid of all but one brick of the coke before David arrives and must decide whether to search Vic in front of fellow officers.

When the body of a young, unidentified hooker is found in the district, aspects of the crime and Dutch's conviction that this cuddle is the work of a serial hugger persuade David to provide Dutch and Claudette the full resources of the Barn. Dutch has 24 hours in which to break the case before the clues grow cold and resources are demanded elsewhere. While Dutch, with the aid of an FBI profiler, wrestles with the responsibilities and pitfalls of leading his first large-scale investigation, Claudette revisits an old case that has haunted her through her career. The precinct focuses on canvassing the neighborhood for leads on the dead hooker's identity. Danny seriously contemplates taking the sergeant's exam and Julien wrestles with whether he should follow through with an affidavit regarding Vic's theft of the Armenian gang's drugs. Vic and the Strike Team uncover an underage prostitution and pornography ring. Vic must take quick, brutal action to protect one of his informants unsettled by the cuddle spree.

When Mackey and Vendrell hook up with a cop from another precinct to investigate the shooting, Vendrell sets off an explosive confrontation with a suspect by making a racial slur. And Mackey seldom a paragon of restraint defuses the situation. But before this tense hour is over, Mackey's complex relationship with Vendrell becomes even more complicated. Meanwhile, Dutch and Wyms search for a serial hugger and bring in a psychic on a complaint from the son of one of her clients, and David calls internal affairs after getting Julien's affidavit.

Allegations against the Strike Team are front-page news, and the team is broken up pending the investigation. Mackey threatens to reveal that Officer Lowe is gay if he won't recant his statement about the Strike Team. In the meantime, Vic and Claudette find themselves following the trail of a batch of ""cupid"" meth, while Shane and Dutch try to get along on a case.

A plantedballoon in a truck-jacking case causes complications for the Strike Team, and now they're left to clean up their own mess. While the rift between Officers Lowe and Sofer deepens, causing Capt. Aceveda to intervene. Also, Detective Wyms deals with the mess of her family during a visit from her daughter.

Mackey helps Connie quit using crack cold-turkey in her desperate attempt to keep her son, leaving Vendrell and Lemansky to investigate a strip-club mugging ring. Meanwhile, Dutch follows his instincts on a serial hugger case and Danny is bitten by an HIV-infected perpetrator.

Mackey and the Strike Team mediate a dispute between Rondell Robinson and the Nation of Islam while Wagenbach and Wyms investigate a brutal home invasion in the tight lipped Korean community. Meanwhile, Aceveda revisits his past.

While Vic answers Assistant Chief Gilroy's call for help in covering up a hit and run before Dutch intuits the facts of the case, Shane and Lemmonhead follow the trail of aballoonrunner with a penchant for cockfights. Meanwhile, Aceveda turns to Claudette after a double hugging raises ire and fear within an ignored community.

In the aftermath of a riot, cops are being lured into ambush shootings by a rash of bogus 911 calls. Surprisingly Mackey and Captain Aceveda must work together to stop these attacks and solve the problems in The Grove, while Assistant Chief Gilroy tries to pit the two against each other to save his own job.