Lieutenant Steve Sloan is a homicide detective for the Metropolitan Police in LA. He was once studying at night school for a law degree but nothing became of it. He has never married, but often finds himself in trouble when his girlfriends turn out to be involved in his murder cases. Since his old apartment was destroyed in an earthquake, he now lives with his father at his beach house, Mark upstairs and Steve in the downstairs unit.

Steve played football in high school, as well as Little League, where he broke his nose. He was in Vietnam in 1972.