A&E orders new scripted police drama

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 26 (UPI) -- A&E says it has given the go-ahead to a new scripted police drama "Sugarloaf," starring Australian actor Matt Passmore.

The cast of the show includes Kiele Sanchez and Carlos Gomez.

Fox Television Studios is to begin production on a 13-episode run in Miami this winter for a summer premiere.

Passmore will play Jim Longworth, "an attractive, brilliant, yet hard to get along with homicide detective from Chicago who after being wrongfully accused of sleeping with his former captain's wife is forced into exile," A&E said in a news release Thursday.

"Longworth relocates to Sugarloaf, a sleepy small resort town in the middle of nowhere on the Gulf Coast of Florida where the sunshine and golf are plentiful and crime is seemingly at a minimum. Yet life in Sugarloaf is not as beautiful as it may seem."

"Matt Passmore brings a fresh face and a vibrant presence to the American television landscape in this series," Tana Nugent Jamieson -- senior vice president of drama programming for A&E Network -- said in a statement. "'Sugarloaf' is an exciting character-driven series that marries the gritty style of a police procedural with the blue-sky backdrop of rural Florida. It's pure entertainment that will complement the network's current lineup of hit real-life series and off-net dramas."