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Sergeant John Munch is a fictional character played by actor Richard Belzer. Munch first appeared on Homicide: Life on the Street. Upon that series' cancellation, the character was transplanted to Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, the first spin-off of the Law & Order franchise. He made his 300th appearance on the SVU episode "Unorthodox".

Munch first appears as a central character in the TV series Homicide: Life on the Street, as a homicide detective in the Baltimore Police Department's fictionalized homicide unit, which debuted January 31, 1993. The character was primarily based on Jay Landsman, a central figure in David Simon's true crime book Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets, a documentary account of the homicide unit's operation over one year. However, Munch's storyline also touched on the book's depiction of the relationship between real-life detectives Donald Worden and David Brown, in which Worden was relentless in his tutelage/hazing of the younger detective but also genuinely wanted him to succeed and was impressed when the younger cop did excellent work. A storyline in the book involving Brown's cracking a very difficult hit-and-run homicide was included almost verbatim in the show's pilot.

Munch appeared as a regular character in every season, and in almost every episode, of Homicide. After Homicide: Life on the Street concluded its seventh season in May 1999, the character was transferred into the Law & Order universe as a regular character on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (both Homicide and the original Law & Order had crossed-over numerous times before, and Munch had featured centrally in each crossover). It is explained that Munch had retired from the Baltimore Police Department, took his pension, and moved to New York to join a sex crime investigation unit, where he was eventually given a promotion to sergeant.

Munch joined the BPD's homicide unit in 1983. During the fourth-season premiere of Homicide: Life on the Street, he signed up to take a promotion exam in hopes of becoming a sergeant, but a "comedy of errors" prevented him from showing up for it. In the first episode of the ninth season of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, it is revealed that he passed the NYPD sergeant's exam, having taken it on a bar bet, and earned his promotion. He is temporarily promoted to commanding officer of the Special Victims' Unit following Cragen's temporary reassignment but is depicted as happily relinquishing control back to Donald Cragen, commenting upon Cragen's return, "This job sucks". He has, however, kept his rank, as he is still referred to as Sergeant in later episodes. He is temporarily put in charge again when Cragen gets suspended after the detectives mishandled the Nikki Sherman rape case.

John Munch has not been a contender in any CBUB matches.