 DATE: When the cop is killed, he is in the middle of a telephone  conversation. However, the electricity had already been switched  off. Nowadays, telephone lines operate independently of the public  power grid, allowing phones to be used even during power outages.  However, such has not always been the case. In the early 1950s, when  this movie was set, a power outage, deliberate or otherwise, would  have terminated an existing phone conversation and made new phone  calls impossible.