LAW & ORDER: SPECIAL VICTIMS UNIT {LAW AND ORDER: SVU}: POISON (TV)

Summary

One in this series of police dramas—a spin-off of "Law & Order"—about the sexual crimes investigated by the elite Special Victims Unit of the New York Police Department. In this episode, a young girl, Alexis, is hospitalized and the doctors suspect poisoning. The girl’s aunt accuses the adoptive mother, saying she is often cruel to the child. When Elliot interviews the girl’s seven-year-old sister, Katie, she tells him that she saw the mother forcing Alexis to drink soapy water. Olivia and Elliot quickly arrest the mother, Karen, when she comes to the hospital. She denies the charges, claiming her daughter accidentally ingested the chemicals, and her husband defends her, but the detectives are convinced of her guilt. Dr. Huang interviews Katie again to determine if she knows the difference between truth and lies, and confirms that she will make a sufficient witness. However, the judge on the case, Taft, doubts that the girl’s testimony will be reliable and demands to interview her himself. When he does so, he bullies and confuses her to tears, and deems her unfit. He agrees to try Karen’s case, but questions Elliot on the stand to determine whether or not he unfairly influenced Katie’s statement. Karen’s lawyer makes it appear as though Elliot suggested the mother’s guilt to her daughter, and Katie’s statement is thrown out. Elliot objects angrily, and Taft holds him in contempt. Casey’s friend, Judge Mary Clark, gets Elliot out of jail and sternly advises Casey to play nice with Taft, as he is known for his harsh techniques.

Karen waives her right to a jury trial, meaning that Taft will determine her guilt or innocence by himself, and Casey objects, and then asks Taft to recuse (remove) himself from the case due to his perceived bias in Karen’s favor. This fails, and Casey meets with Mary again, determined to prove Taft’s unethical actions. She plans to plead Karen down to a lesser charge, knowing Taft will not find her guilty of attempted murder, but Elliot’s investigation reveals that Karen attempted to “return” Alexis after adopting her, implying that she considered her a burden. When questioned, Karen claims she felt overwhelmed by her four children, but again denies poisoning her daughter. Casey uses the doctor’s testimony to poke holes in Karen’s story, but despite overwhelming evidence, Taft determines that she is innocent and that Alexis’ poisoning was an accident. Furious, Casey declares her intentions to have Taft thrown off the bench.

Mary has doubts about her crusade, but Casey looks into Taft’s former cases and finds many instances of biased behavior and unscrupulous decision-making, particularly the case of Rosalin Silvo, a mother who was convicted of poisoning her baby. Casey talks to Silvo’s former lawyer, who explains that Taft disallowed an expert defense witness and condemned Silvo out of a class bias, believing her to be an unfit mother. The autopsy concluded that the baby was poisoned with antifreeze, but when the detectives question the expert witness, a genetic professor, he says that he theorized that the baby had a rare disease that mimicked the symptoms of antifreeze poisoning, and says a newer test could tell the difference. Elliot and Olivia interview Silvo, who maintains her innocence and gives them permission to exhume her daughter’s body. Warner determines that the baby did in fact have the disease, and that the hospital’s mistaken treatment was actually what killed her, meaning that Silvo is innocent and has served ten years in prison for nothing. Mary, now convinced of Taft’s irresponsibility, takes Silvo’s case and quickly has her freed from jail and reunited with her other daughter. As they celebrate their victory, however, Casey receives a phone call and learns that Alexis is dead.

Karen is quickly arrested for suffocating her daughter, and claims that Taft told her during her first trial that Alexis would be better off dead rather than brain-damaged and in pain, and also told her to seek psychiatric help, suggesting he was aware of her guilt. As he is not legally allowed to have a private, or “ex parte,” conversation with a defendant while she was on trial, Casey immediately has him arrested for facilitating the murder. The judge at Taft’s trial is not happy with Casey’s bold move and dismisses the case right away, but Taft is forced to testify at Karen’s hearing. Casey questions him heatedly about his talk with Karen and his culpability in Alexis’ death, bringing up Silvo’s case to prove her point, and Taft finally shouts that he thought Alexis’ family were “good people” and therefore inaccurately deemed the mother innocent. Karen is found guilty of first-degree murder, and as Taft leaves the court, he is besieged with reporters asking about his questionable decisions and wrongful convictions, to Casey’s great satisfaction. Commercials deleted.

Details

• NETWORK: NBC
• DATE: May 11, 2004 10:00 PM
• RUNNING TIME: 0:43:14
• COLOR/B&W: Color
• CATALOG ID: B:85406
• GENRE: Drama, police/detective
• SUBJECT HEADING: Drama, police/detective; Asian American Pacific Islanders Collection
• SERIES RUN: NBC - TV series, 1999-
• COMMERCIALS: N/A

CREDITS

• Peter Jankowski … Executive Producer
• Neal Baer … Executive Producer
• Ted Kotcheff … Executive Producer
• Dick Wolf … Executive Producer, Created by
• Jonathan Greene … Co-Executive Producer
• Roz Weinman … Co-Executive Producer
• Lisa Marie Petersen … Co-Executive Producer
• Dawn DeNoon … Co-Executive Producer
• Robert Nathan … Co-Executive Producer
• Arthur W. Forney … Co-Executive Producer
• Patrick Harbinson … Co-Executive Producer
• Randy Roberts … Supervising Producer
• Michele Fazekas … Supervising Producer, Writer
• Tara Butters … Supervising Producer, Writer
• Peter Leto … Producer
• David DeClerque … Producer
• Sheyna Kathleen Smith … Associate Producer
• David Platt … Director
• Mike Post … Music by
• Christopher Meloni … Cast, Detective Elliot Stabler
• Mariska Hargitay … Cast, Detective Olivia Benson
• Richard Belzer … Cast, Detective John Munch
• Diane Neal … Cast, A.D.A. Casey Novak
• Ice-T … Cast, Detective Odafin 'Fin' Tutuola
• B.D. Wong … Cast, Dr. George Huang
• Dann Florek … Cast, Captain Donald Cragen
• Tom Skerritt … Cast, Judge Oliver Taft
• Marlo Thomas … Cast, Judge Mary Clark
• Cynthia Gibb … Cast, Karen Campbell
• Alicia Goranson … Cast, Rosalin Silvo
• Sean Cullen … Cast, Pete Campbell
• Sloane Momsen … Cast, Katie Campbell
• Audrie Neenan … Cast, Judge Lois Preston
• Matthew Sussman … Cast, Lawrence Alcott
• Rebecca Luker … Cast, Wendy Campbell
• Peter McRobbie … Cast, Judge Walter Bradley
• Tamara Tunie … Cast, M.E. Warner
• Barry Bostwick … Cast, Oliver Gates
• Michael Goodwin … Cast, William Keldon
• William Whitehead … Cast, Judge Wyler
• Craig Wroe … Cast, James Woodrow
• Laura E. Johnston … Cast, Court Reporter
• Spencer Scott Barros … Cast, Jury Foreman
• Dan Haft … Cast, Court Clerk
• Dave Thomsen … Cast, Reporter #1
• Wallis Herst … Cast, Reporter #2
• April Armstrong … Cast, Reporter #3