The character Tony Scali was based on the real-life 30th Commissioner of New York City's Department of Correction, Anthony Schembri, the son of an Italian immigrant, who grew up in Brooklyn. Schembri recalls incidents such as his deflecting a man intent on suicide from wanting to jumping off of a roof: “I asked him if he had a permit to jump off.” This means of diversion was used in a series one episode and is typical of Scali’s way of working in the series. Schembri later served as the Secretary of the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice under Governor Jeb Bush, as the Citrus County Florida County Administrator, and later still as an advisor to India’s Centre for Criminology and Public Policy Committee.