 Robert T. Ironside, chief of detectives with the San Francisco Police Department, is shot down by a sniper s bullet while vacationing at a remote cabin. Ironside survived the attack, but became crippled from the waist down, and was confined the wheelchair. Realizing his skills as a crime-buster were too good to waste, Ironside became the head of his own special police unit; he moved into a specially-built office at SFPD headquarters, complete with sleeping quarters and exercise equipment, and inherited a crack staff: bland Sgt. Ed Brown, beautiful young Policewoman Eve Whitfield, and black ex-con Mark Sanger, who pushed Ironside s wheelchair and drove his special van. Whitfield eventually left the department, and was replaced by Policewoman Fran Belding, while Sanger graduated from law school, passed the bar, and married Diana.