law & order: svu
lowdown (20/25)

The Law & Order spin-off following New York’s elite special victims unit continues its fifth season. Tonight, the detectives attempt to unravel the murder of a Bronx ADA found dead in his car in a red-light district.

Benson is in for a shock when she arrives at the scene of the unit’s latest homicide – the victim is ADA Jeffrey York from the Bronx, a man she briefly dated. York has been strangled with a pair of leggings in a well-known curb-crawling street, and a used condom is found next to the body. Benson immediately clashes with Stabler over York’s involvement with prostitutes, especially when he suggests that only a man would have had the strength to choke him. “Jeff York wasn’t the kind of guy for street sex –and definitely not transvestites,” she asserts.

York’s colleague, fellow ADA Andy Abbott (Michael Beach, ‘Third Watch’, ‘ER’), tells the cops that the most likely suspect is a drug dealer named Alvarez, whom York recently prosecuted for murder. But Alvarez is jailed at Rikers Island and his phone record and visitors’ log prove that he could not have hired anybody to kill the ADA.

The case takes a sharp turn when ME Warner reports that DNA traces on the condom in the car confirm that York was with another man. “No wonder you and Jeff didn’t have any chemistry,” Stabler tells Benson. “He was gay!” A shocked Benson is forced to reassess what she knew about Jeff York – starting at his apartment. There the detectives discover evidence that the victim was HIV positive, and that he had an appointment for drinks with Andy Abbott the night he died. Confronted with this information, Abbott claims he forgot to mention being with York that night, and is shocked to hear that his colleague was gay.

However, suspicion begins to swirl around Abbott when Fin brings to light three murder cases in the Bronx that all share similar aspects with the Jeff York homicide – and they were all prosecuted by Andy Abbott. The detectives also wonder if Abbott was embroiled in some kind of relationship with the victim. The ADA becomes riled when he learns he is a suspect, and refuses to hand over a DNA sample to compare with the condom from the scene. “What possible motive could I have to kill Jeff?” he cries. Benson, meanwhile, worries about Abbott’s wife. “Jeff was HIV positive and Andy might be too,” she says. But the detectives are forbidden from alerting Mrs Abbott to her possible infection.

The cops turn their attention to a poker game attended by Abbott on the night of the murder. He says this is a regular evening for he and his black friends to unwind, but Fin suspects the poker group may have something to hide. “I think they’re on the ‘down-low’ –black men having sex with other men,” he says. After explaining that many black men are in denial about their homosexuality because of its taboo nature, Fin goes to get the full story from one of the poker players – retired American footballer DuShawn McGovern.

McGovern is forced to admit that the poker games were really sex parties, but denies he is gay. “I have relationships with women and sex with men,” he claims. Eventually McGovern is pressed into revealing that Abbott killed York in a fit of rage after York confessed to having feelings for him. “Jeff fell in love with Andy at work [and] wanted him to leave his wife,” he says. But McGovern refuses to testify to avoid outing himself, and Abbott uses his legal expertise to thwart ADA Novak’s case against him.

To make matters worse, Novak risks her own career when she warns Mrs Abbott that her husband is HIV positive and tells her to get tested. Having broken confidential medical records, Abbott’s lawyer files to have Novak debarred, throwing the case into disarray. Will Abbott walk away a free man?