The book that the shooting victim's sister is reading in the hospital waiting room is Beloved by Toni Morrison (Ben says that he likes the book and read it for a Black Studies class). "Beloved" was published in 1987 and won the Pulitzer Prize. In 2006 a panel of writers and critics named it the best work of American fiction of the past 25 years. It is one of the most frequently assigned novels in the American secondary and higher education system.
Executive Producer John Wells told interviewer Michael Jensen at afterelton.com that the scene in which the bar that Officer John Cooper visits is revealed to be a gay bar was originally much longer and less subtle, but the first cut of the pilot went seven minutes over, so they had to cut some of that content. Nonetheless, the scene was supposed to establish Cooper as a gay character, a fact that was hotly denied by some viewers until Cooper outed himself to Ben during the show's second season.
Both Shawn Hatosy and C. Thomas Howell have played serial killers in the show Criminal Minds (2005).
Taylor Handley, who plays Wade, also played Ben McKenzie's rival on several episodes of the first season of The O.C. (2003).
There are two connections to Beverly Hills, 90210 (1990)--Officer John Cooper Michael Cudlitz mentions Tori Spelling, who starred in it, and Cudlitz himself had a small role in it.