Law & Order

Season 15

Paradigm

1. A.D.A. Serena Southerlyn asks E.A.D.A. Jack McCoy if the decision from a judge was close. Jack responds, "More like the Yankees and the Red Sox. It's inevitable the Red Sox won't be there when it counts but they still have to play all the games." This episode aired on September 22nd, 2004. On October 20th, the Red Sox beat the Yankees in the American League Championship Series, after being down in the series, 3-0. The Red Sox went on to win the World Series a week later, for the first time in 86 years, after sweeping the St. Louis Cardinals.
2. Dennis Farina's first appearance as Detective Joe Fontana. It was also the first time he used the phrase "We're authorized" when trying to get access to something. Farina had ad-libbed the line and it became a recurring event in the course of his appearances.
3. According to Dick Wolf, Detective Joe Fontana is named after Wolf's old friend, producer Tom Fontana.
4. After meeting Detective Joe Fontana, Detective Ed Green says he "...wasn't sure if he was a cop or a wiseguy". Dennis Farina was a cop in Chicago before becoming an actor, and in his film debut, Michael Mann's Thief (1981), he has a small role as the henchman of a mobster as well as later playing a vicious mafia boss in Midnight Run (1988) opposite Robert De Niro.
5. This episode appears to be based on the 2003 Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse scandal.
6. Nadira Latif Harrington was born on April 14, 1975 (making the character 29 years old). The actress who portrays her, Sarita Choudhury, was born on August 18, 1966 (making the actress 38 years old at the time).

The Dead Wives Club

1. The trademark "donk-donk" sound first appears in this episode during the introductory segment before the opening credits - very unusual for an episode of "Law & Order".
2. Detective Joe Fontana says that when someone is killed in United States territorial waters due to a criminal, reckless or negligent act the death can fall under federal jurisdiction. This is true for the most part, though in most situations the federal government leaves the investigation up to local police. However if the crime occurs more than three miles off the coast it is investigated by the United States Coast Guard, specifically C.G.I.S. (Coast Guard Investigative Service) which is the criminal investigative division of the Coast Guard.
3. This episode appears to be based on three separate cases/incidents:
   • The 2003 Staten Island Ferry crash.
   • The post-September-11-attack climate in the United States.
   • The controversial Low Copy Number DNA profiling technique. Low copy DNA analysis was not a widely accepted method of testing DNA at the time of this episode's filming. However as of 2018 it is a widely accepted and accurate method of extracting DNA from a very small sample. In fact it is now possible to get a DNA sample from fingerprints, specifically from the skin oils in the fingerprint.

The Brotherhood

1. This episode appears to be based on two separate cases/incidents:
   • The Aryan Brotherhood prison gang.
   • The 2003 Matthew Hale case involving federal judge Joan Lefkow.
2. The last television role of Daniel von Bargen.
3. First appearance of Candice Bergen as Judge Amanda Anderlee, she reprises this role in three future episodes of Law & Order: Trial by Jury (2005):
   • The Abominable Showman (2005).
   • 41 Shots (2005).
   • Baby Boom (2005).
4. Vincent Laresca (Feo Ruiz) previously played the role of Danny In episode 2.17, Sisters of Mercy (1992).

Coming Down Hard

1. This episode appears to be based on the 2003-2004 slew of suicides that took place at New York University.
2. Amy Hohn has played four different characters over the course of the series:
   • Episode 5.7 Precious (1994) - Assistant M.E. Manning.
   • Episode 6.3 Savages (1995) - Assistant M.E. Manning.
   • Episode 7.16 Turnaround (1997) - Canton.
   • Episode 10.14 Entitled (2000) - Delia Woodruff.
   • Episode 15.4 Coming Down Hard (2004) - Defense Attorney Laura Dixon.
   • Episode 19.9 By Perjury (2009) - Defense Attorney Laura Dixon.
3. Kim Director (Female Undercover Cop) previously played the role of a waitress in episode 11.16, Bronx Cheer (2001).

Gunplay

1. At one point, Detective Joe Fontana (Dennis Farina) is asked if he'd ever worked undercover to which he replies: 'Yeah, about a million years ago, in Chicago'. He was indeed a real detective with the Chicago P.D. for many years before eventually becoming an actor.
2. This episode appears to be based on the 2003 Ronell Wilson case.
3. Isiah Whitlock Jr. and Wendell Pierce appear together as defendant and his defense attorney. They had appeared together in The Wire (2002) as regulars, as a state senator and a police detective.
4. Isiah Whitlock Jr. played five different characters over the course of the series:
   • Episode 5.11 Guardian (1995) - Antony White.
   • Episode 6.12 Trophy (1996) - Simon Brooks.
   • Episode 6.19 Slave (1996) - Fred Oates.
   • Episode 10.10 Loco Parentis (2000) - Fred Oakes.
   • Episode 11.4 Standoff (2000) - Captain Navarro.
   • Episode 15.5 Gunplay (2004) - Gordon Samuels.
5. Hassan Johnson was also on The Wire (2002).
6. John Speredakos has played four different characters over the course of the series:
   • Episode 2.18 Cradle to Grave (1992) - Dr. Orton.
   • Episode 8.3 Navy Blues (1997) - William T. Ottenberg.
   • Episode 15.5 Gunplay (2004) - Bob Ardall.
   • Episode 20.23 Rubber Room (2010) - A.U.S.A. Schlicter.

Cut

1. This episode appears to be based on the 2004 Olivia Goldsmith case.
2. Detective Joe Fontana and Dr. Lawrence's receptionist bond over being Chicago natives and Cubs fans. Dennis Farina actually was a Cubs fan in real life.

Gov Love

1. This episode appears to be based on four separate cases/incidents:
   • The scandalous 2004 resignation of New Jersey Governor James McGreevey (which became effective five days after this episode aired).
   • The 2004 scandal involving Connecticut Governor John Rowland (also resulting in his own resignation).
   • The 2004 Jason West case.
   • The brief period of gay marriages in 2004 that were permitted at the direction of San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom and later annulled by the California Supreme Court.
2. Actor Zeljko Ivanek (Richard Kaplan) also starred on Law & Order's sister series Homicide: Life on the Street (1993), which is the series where Richard Belzer's character of John Munch from Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999) originated from. Homicide had several crossovers with Law & Order with ASA Danvers appearing in the episodes Baby, It's You (1997) and Sideshow (1999).
3. Jack McCoy is being hypocritical when he tells Serena Southerlyn that the Governor (a man in power) should not hit on (flirt) with his subordinates. Jack McCoy is notoriously for having romantic affairs with his female ADAs (his equals but also subordinates due to him having more experience) The ADAs with whom McCoy had affairs included Sally Bell who later became a defense attorney; Diana Hawthorne ; and Claire Kincaid. McCoy also had a romantic relationship with his frequent courtroom adversary, defense attorney Vanessa Galiano. Defense attorneys have used his sexual history against him.

Cry Wolf

1. This episode appears to be based on the 1992 attempted murder of Curtis Sliwa by Teflon Don' John Gotti and his trial in 2005.
2. First acting credit for Nicolette Hart who plays Tina.

All in the Family

1. The bit about the two actresses shadowing the police as research for their basic cable cop show was an inside joke about the TBS show Rizzoli & Isles (2010), starring L&O alum Angie Harmon.

Enemy

1. Guillermo Diaz makes an uncredited appearance as one of people in the photo line up with the female shooting victim. He is in the second set in the bottom right corner.

Fixed

1. This episode appears to be based on Joel Steinberg's release from prison in 2004 by revisiting the events of the episode Indifference (1990), (which was based on the arrest and trial of Steinberg) and focuses on the murder trial of Dr. Jacob Lowenstein and his wife Carla Lowenstein. Both David Groh and Marcia Jean Kurtz reprise their roles from 14 years earlier while Dann Florek makes a guest appearance as Captain Donald Cragen, who was a regular cast member of Law & Order (1990) at the time of that episode.
2. Dann Florek's final appearance in the original series.
3. This was the noteworthy first appearance of Noah Dize's as 'Concerned/Blurry Audience Member in Blue Shirt', a role that soon took on a life of its own.
4. Tracy Thorne is a dead ringer for Linda Hamilton's voice & body transformation for Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991).

Mammon

1. First episode of Law & Order to air after the death of actor Jerry Orbach (Detective Lennie Briscoe), before the credits there was a brief "In Memoriam" dedication to him with his picture being shown, however this was not included on the DVD release.
2. Oddly, both the defense attorney and trial judge have the last name Solomon.
3. The title is from the the Christian Bible meaning "...material wealth or greed...". Mammon was sometimes personified as a god and derives from the ancient Middle Eastern, and ancient Greek word meaning the same. The title is also just one letter different from "Ammon", the last name of multimillionaire Ted Ammon upon whose murder the story is loosely based. The plot also includes elements from Ammon's murder, including; a security system and its hard-drive as evidence; a contractor suspect having an affair with the victim's wife; an artist wife who may have played a part in the murder and whose premature death complicated the case; and rumors of the victim's homosexuality; among other details.
4. This episode appears to be based on the 2001 Ted Ammon case.
5. Daniel Sunjata, who plays the episode's murder suspect, had a recurring role on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999) as CSU Technician Burt Trevor.
6. Tracie Thoms (Linda Ziman) appears in this episode. She co-starred in the movie Rent (2005) alongside Jesse L. Martin (Detective Ed Green).
7. Daniel Sunjata (Kenny Tremont) and Andrea Roth (Mrs. Marley Emerson) also worked together on Rescue Me (2004), which first aired five months before this one.
8. Daniel Sunjata and Tracie Thoms were both in the film The Devil Wears Prada (2006) with Anne Hathaway and Meryl Streep. Sunjata portrayed a fashion designer and Thoms portrayed an artist friend of Hathaway's character.
9. Directed by Jace Alexander.

Ain't No Love

1. In an interview with Today, Elisabeth Röhm explained that she left the series because "I didn't have anything else that I could offer this character."
2. Elisabeth Röhm (A.D.A. Serena Southerlyn)'s mid-season departure is only the second in the history of the series. The first was the departure of Paul Sorvino (Sergeant Phil Cerreta) 12 years earlier.
3. This episode appears to be based on the 2002 Jason William Mizell (a.k.a. Jam Master Jay) shooting case.
4. When it originally aired, the ending was heavily criticized for the off-the-cuff manner in which it is revealed that Serena Southerlyn (Elisabeth Röhm) is gay, since there had been no mention of her sexual orientation before. While there was never any previous direct reference to A.D.A. Southerlyn being a lesbian, there were hints and clues that she was gay that some discerning fans picked up on, though it seems most missed them.All of the previous female A.D.A.'s on the series had spoken of either their current or past relationships, yet Serena always avoided the subject. The biggest clue was how passionately Serena was in favor of gay rights whenever the subject came up in a case. In fact in Gov Love (2004) she stated quite firmly that she felt it was wrong for Branch and McCoy to try and use the strategy of arguing that a gay, married couple did not have the same rights as a straight couple, and that arguing otherwise was setting back gay rights by 20 years. She went so far as to tell McCoy that she would not support him or even sit second chair with him when he went before the Supreme Court with the goal of invalidating all of the gay marriages performed in New York State up to that point, saying that she refused to help violate the civil rights of gay New Yorkers.
5. D.A. Arthur Branch's firing of A.D.A. Serena Southerlyn is referenced four months later in the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999) episode Goliath (2005), when Branch yells at A.D.A. Casey Novak "Do I need to remind you that I've been known to fire people?".
6. Given that the victim is believed to be based on the shooting death of Jam Master Jay of Run-D.M.C., the line that RC Flex "rocked until he sold out and made that record with that grunge band" is far more likely to be a reference to the collaboration of Run DMC with Aerosmith.
7. D.A. Arthur Branch (Fred Thompson) dismisses A.D.A. Serena Southerlyn (Elisabeth Röhm) explaining that she is too emotional (and sympathetic toward the defendant). Interestingly, many fans were glad to see her character finally go, citing Elisabeth Röhm's portrayal of A.D.A. Southerlyn as lacking emotion. Some described her as "cold and robotic."
8. Sean Nelson would return later in the recurring role of Lt. VanBuren's son
9. The last name of the officer being questioned is the same last name of the officer in Superman: The Movie.

Fluency

1. First appearance of Annie Parisse as A.D.A. Alexandra Borgia.
2. It's a fairly common misconception that getting the influenza vaccine can give you the flu. The vaccine contains dead viral organisms, so it is impossible for them to cause an actual infection. However, the immune system recognizes the dead virus as being alive and a threat to the body so it responds accordingly, meaning it attacks them and creates antibodies to prevent future infection by the same strain. This process can cause a person to experience some of the symptoms of influenza infection, since some of the symptoms (symptoms such as fever, swelling, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea) a person experiences while sick are caused by the immune system fighting the infection and trying to expel the pathogen from the body. Only a few of the symptoms are caused by the pathogen itself. The symptoms caused by the immune system's reaction to the vaccine are often mild and last for less than 24 hours.
3. Sam Waterston and Annie Parisse are members of the same extended family. In 2006, Parisse's brother, Louis Cancelmi, married Waterston's daughter Elizabeth.
4. When the female drug rep walks out of the Doctor's offices, there are four plaques, each containing the name of a doctor. Three of those names are used as characters in other episodes:Glenda Allen, M.D. - Denial Christian Varick, M.D. - Double Blind Seth Bernstein, M.D. - Ramparts
5. This episode appears to be based on three separate cases/incidents:
   • The 2002 Robert Courtney case. Courtney a former pharmacist from Kansas City, Missouri. In 2002, after initially being caught diluting several doses of chemotherapy drugs, he pleaded guilty to intentionally diluting 98,000 prescriptions involving multiple types of drugs, which were given to 4,200 patients, and was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison
   • The shortage of the flu vaccine in the United States during the winter 2004-2005 flu season.
   • The British noir film The Third Man (1949).
6. When A.D.A. Alexandra Borgia is describing the cons the "career con-man" was involved in, she described a con where he bought totaled cars and reassembled them and selling them. "The chassis were so bad they were unsafe at any speed." A reference to the book "Unsafe at Any Speed" by Ralph Nader, who brought to light the reluctance of the auto makers to make cars safer because of the cost. It also brought to light the problems with the Chevrolet Corvair.
7. McCoy refers to Harry Lime's dialogue of justification for his actions in the movie The Third Man. In that dialogue Lime refers to "Italy under the rule of the Borgias. Coincidentally McCoy's new assistant is named Alexandra Borgia.

Obsession

1. This episode appears to be based on two separate cases/incidents:
   • The 2004 Bill O'Reilly sexual harassment scandal.
   • The 1999 Celeste Beard Johnson case. Beard was convicted of conspiracy to murder her husband, Steven Beard who, at 75, was rich and more than twice her age. The shotgun trigger was actually pulled in 1999 by Tracey Tarlton who alleged that she was Celeste's lesbian lover. The pair met at a mental health facility treating clients with depression. Tracey made a plea deal, testifying that Celeste manipulated her into killing Steven by claiming he was abusive.
2. The film maker that Green and Fontana interview, based upon his appearance and confrontational approach to film making, was meant to resemble controversial documentarian Michael Moore.

The Sixth Man

1. This episode appears to be based on four separate cases/incidents:
   • The 2000 Ray Lewis murder trial.
   • The 1999 Rae Carruth attempted murder case.
   • The brawl that broke out at a 2004 game between the Indiana Pacers and Detroit Piston on November 19.
   • The 1997 attack on Warriors head coach P.J. Carlesimo by All-Star Latrell Sprewell. The altercation made national headlines and the resulting uproar ultimately led to the team voiding the remainder of Sprewell's contract.
2. When discussing the perils of high-profile trials with celebrity defendants, D.A. Arthur Branch and A.D.A. Alexandra Borgia mention football players Rae Carruth and Ray Lewis.Rae Carruth was a professional football player who played for the Colorado Buffalos in college and in the NFL from 1997-1999 for the Carolina Panthers. He is also a convicted murderer after having had his girlfriend, Cherica Adams, killed. Ms. Adams was a real estate agent whom Carruth had been casually dating at the time. She became pregnant with his child after a short time. On the night of November 16, 1999, Adams was driving home from work when she was stopped just a few blocks from her home by a car pulling in front of her and suddenly stopping; the car was driven by Carruth. While she was stopped, another car driven by Van Brett Watkins Sr. (a night club manager who was friends with Carruth), pulled alongside her and Mr. Watkins proceeded to fire a number of shots into her car, four of them hitting her, then both cars fled the scene. Adams was able to call 911 and identify both Carruth and Watkins before losing consciousness. She was rushed to the hospital, where her baby was delivered by emergency C-section shortly after Adams slipped into a coma. Carruth was arrested and initially charged with attempted murder in the second degree and released on $3,000,000 bail, on the condition that he immediately surrender himself to police custody if Ms. Adams or the baby died. Adams was in a coma for almost a month before dying on December 14. Her baby survived but had severe brain damage, including cerebral palsy, due to not getting sufficient oxygen in the 70-minute interval between the mother being shot and the baby being delivered. Upon learning of the death of Ms. Adams, Carruth fled the state but was apprehended the following day in Tennessee by the United States Marshals Service. He was found hiding in the trunk of a car parked in a motel parking lot. Also found in the trunk were $3,900 in cash, bottles of his own urine, and a cell phone. Carruth was ultimately brought up on charges of murder in the first degree, conspiracy to commit murder, unlawful use of a weapon, and attempting to commit an unjustified abortion. The prosecution claimed his motive was that Ms. Adams refused to get an abortion after learning that he was the father of her baby. The jury found him guilty on all charges but one. The jury concluded that the prosecution hadn't shown sufficient evidence that Carruth paid Watkins to commit the murder so they found him not guilty of first-degree murder, Carruth was spared both the death penalty and a life sentence. For the conspiracy, weapons, and attempted abortion charges he was sentenced to 18-24 years in prison and became eligible for parole on October 18, 2018. Carruth was paroled from the Sampson Correctional Institute in Clinton, North Carolina, on October 22, 2018. Ray Lewis was a pro football player who was in the NFL for 17 years and played for the Baltimore Ravens. He was a middle linebacker for his entire career and was considered one of the best players in history for that position.Following a Super Bowl 34 party in Atlanta, Georgia on January 31, 2000, Lewis and a few of his friends were involved in a fight with another group of people which resulted in two of the men in the other group, Jacinth Baker and Richard Lollar, being stabbed to death. Lewis and his friends, Reginald Oakley and Joseph Sweeting were questioned by the Atlanta Police in connection with the stabbing. Lewis claimed to have not been present at the scene of the stabbing. After the crime lab found blood from one of the stabbing victims in the limo that Lewis and his friends had used that night, all three were arrested on charges of murder in the second degree and aggravated assault in the first degree. Lewis proceeded to change his story and admitted that he was at the scene of the stabbing and that it was his two companions that had done it. In exchange, Lewis' attorney negotiated a plea deal on his behalf wherein the Fulton County DA's office dropped the murder and aggravated assault charges against him in exchange for him pleading guilty to obstruction of justice and testifying against his friends. Lewis testified that his friends had both bought knives at a sporting goods store where they had been signing autographs. The knives they bought matched the knife found at the scene, however, no DNA or fingerprints could be recovered from the knife. Lewis's two friends were eventually found not guilty on all counts and in accordance with his plea deal, Lewis was sentenced to 12 months probation for giving a false statement to a police officer and was fined $250,000 by the NFL. As of August 2018, no other suspects have been identified in connection with the murders.
3. Actor Joe Morton (ADA Chiles) and actress S. Epatha Merkersen (Lt. Van Buren) played husband and wife in Terminator 2.

License to Kill

1. Four months before this episode aired six hunters were killed and two wounded in western Wisconsin when someone was ordered off private property. Detective Joe Fontana made reference to hunting in Door County, Wisconsin as a boy. Door County is on the peninsula east of Green Bay.
2. This episode appears to be based on two separate cases:
   • The 2004 Chai Vang case.
   • The 1982 Carl Robert Brown case.
3. Chai Vang passed away on June 10, 2026.

Dining Out

1. The set for the cooking show the defendant stars in is the same set from the Food Network series 30 Minute Meals (2001) starring Rachael Ray.
2. "Voir dire" is Old French and translates as "to speak the truth". In the context of common law it is used in the United States as the term for the jury selection process, specifically the portion of the process that involves both the prosecution and defense questioning potential jurors about their background, any potential biases they might have and also about whether they have heard of the defendant and/or the case being tried and if so further questions are asked to determine whether the potential juror has formed an opinion as to the guilt or innocence of the defendant without first hearing all of the evidence. If either the prosecution or defense is not satisfied that the potential juror can be relied on to remain open minded and judge the case on the merits of the evidence and not on any biases or preconceived notions he or she has then that juror is challenged and if the other side doesn't object that juror is dismissed from service.
3. The accountant from the U.S. Attorney's Charity Fraud Unit says that at least 60% of the money raised by a charity must go to the people it's intended to help for the charity to be considered effective, if not the charity faces being shut down and possibly even criminal charges. He then states that the charity that was run by the victim raised $4,600,000 the previous year, of that only $30,000 was paid out. Detective Green comments sarcastically that amount is just slightly under 60%; the charity only donated 0.65% of the money they took in.
4. Sadly, Kamar de los Reyes, who played Chef Moretti, passed away Christmas Eve, Dec. 24, 2023. He finished his final role in Daredevil: Born Again with Vincent D'Onofrio who stared as Detective Goren in Law-and-Order Criminal Intent.
5. This episode features a supporting character who appears to be inspired by celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay.
6. Wendie Malick, who played a defense attorney in this episode, later on played a prosecutor in the Night Court reboot.

Sects

1. After the conclusion of the trial, A.D.A. Alexandra Borgia expresses her disbelief that someone as evil and wicked as Mrs. Shelby likened herself to such people as Jesus Christ, Mohammad, Buddha, and Gandhi. To which EADA McCoy replies: "one may smile, and smile, and be a villain."E.A.D.A. Jack McCoy is quoting from Shakespeare's "Hamlet", Act 1, Scene 5. Hamlet said this in reference to the main antagonist of the story, which was his way of warning people that the worst and most evil of people will often smile and pretend to be good in order to disarm their enemies and put them at ease, giving them a false sense of safety.
2. This episode appears to be based on the Children of God cult and the related 2005 Ricky "Davidito" Rodriguez case. The cult was led by Ann Hamilton Byrne, who thought she was a reincarnation of Christ.
3. At the end of the episode Jack McCoy quotes a line from Shakespeare spoken by Hamlet: "One may smile, and smile, and be a villain." This was not Sam Waterston's first occasion to say the line: he played Hamlet onstage for the New York Shakespeare Festival in 1975-76.
4. David Thornton, who plays Lionel Granger, is married to singer/musician Cyndi Lauper.
5. When A.D.A. Alexandra Borgia is talking to Mr's Shelby's lawyer, Oswald Jackson at the kiosk, he pays for a sandwich and then turns his back and walks away as the storekeeper tries to give him his change.

Tombstone

1. The storyline of Detective Ed Green being shot in the line of duty was written into the script so that during his "recovery", Jesse L. Martin could be in San Francisco to film Rent (2005).
2. This was Fritz Weaver's final television acting role before his death on November 26, 2016 at the age of 90.
3. The law firm of Cromwell More is a reference to Thomas Cromwell and Thomas More in English history. Cromwell and More were bitter enemies on opposite ends of the Protestant / Catholic divide under Henry VIII.
4. Pamela Gray plays a woman whose sister is killed. In I.D. (1996), she plays a woman who kills her sister.
5. Dennis Farina's character, Det. Joe Fontana says, "You work your side of the street, Mr. McCoy, I'll work mine." This is virtually the exact same line Steve McQueen's character tells Robert Vaughn's character Chalmers in Bullitt (1968).

Publish and Perish

1. This episode appears to be based on the 2004 Bernard Kerik ethics violation scandal. In 2004 George W. Bush nominated Kerik to head Homeland Security, but Kerik soon withdrew his nomination when scrutiny revealed he had employed an illegal immigrant as his children' s nanny. He also became the target of both state and federal investigations, was convicted of several charges, and sentenced to four years in federal prison.
2. Jesse L. Martin was absent from the last four episodes of the fifteenth season. He left the show temporarily to work on Rent (2005). His character, Detective Ed Green, was shot in the line of duty. For those four episodes, Martin was replaced by Michael Imperioli as Detective Nick Falco.
3. While discussing the possibility of a plea bargain the defendant's attorney tells McCoy she believed him to be a "mensch". Mensch is both a German and a Yiddish word, in German it means "human being" and the Yiddish word means "a good person". In American English the term is used to describe a person of integrity and honor.
4. The drug dealer who gives the detectives information on their murder case in exchange for a deal was caught with 1/4th of an ounce of cocaine, which equals 7.09 grams. Without a plea deal he would be facing a charge of Criminal possession of a controlled substance in the third degree, a non-violent class B felony with a minimum prison sentence of 1-3 years and a maximum of 25 years; though considering his extensive previous criminal record he would be looking at much more than 1-3 years as a minimum sentence, more like 8-1/3 years.
5. In addition to playing Detective Nick Falco, actor Michael Imperioli has played two other characters in the L&O franchise:
   • Johnny Stivers in Atonement (1996)
   • Miles Gordon in The Last Hurrah (1997)
6. Both Michael Imperioli and Paul Schulze have appeared in The Sopranos (1999) as Christopher Moltisanti and Father Phil Intintola, respectively.

Sport of Kings

In God We Trust

1. One of the few Law & Order stories that never goes to trial; the only courtroom action involves the hearing on the validity of the defendant's Clayton motion.
2. Justin Lennard was murdered on April 7, 1996.

Locomotion

1. This episode appears to be based on the 2005 Glendale, California Metrolink train crash. Juan Manuel Alvarez slashed his wrists and parked his car on train tracks. He then had a change of heart and walked away from the car which was hit by a commuter train killing 11 people.
2. During Davey Buckley's trial, it's thought that an insanity defense isn't likely to succeed, with it specifically noted that it didn't even work for Andrea Yates, the mother who drowned her kids in the bathtub in Texas and whose insanity defense originally failed when she was convicted of that crime in March 2002.Said conviction, however, was overturned in early 2005 (due to prosecutorial error), and both sides were preparing for a new trial at the time this aired. Andrea pleaded insanity again in the new trial, and that defense ultimately succeeded the second time around, with the second jury delivering that verdict in July 2006.
3. During questioning, a possible suspect initially claimed he boarded a train in Purchase, but later changed his statement to White Plains. Investigators noted the inconsistency, as Purchase has no train station-only bus service connecting to the White Plains rail line.