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A Story of More Woe

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"A Story of More Woe"
← SVU, Episode 20.13 →
Production number: 20013
First aired: 31 January 2019
  th of 502 produced in SVU  
← th of 502 released in SVU →
  th of 1271 released in all  
Written By
Julie Martin & Céline C. Robinson

Directed By
Ray McKinnon

Summary[]

The Special Victims Unit investigate a father's murder after his teen daughters call in a home burglary that turns into an attempted assault. When the squad speaks with the medical examiner, however, they find that the details don't add up.

Plot[]

Britney meets with Greg in the diner, as he tells her that while he is not supposed to talk with her, he assures her that he will get custody of her and Laura. Britney tells him that her sister hasn't been the same and Greg assures her that things will be fine. Britney asks if that meant for the baby, as well stating her belief that her sister might be pregnant. Hearing this, Benson and Fin notes Britney went off-script. Fin offers to pull her out, but Benson stops him, so as to test Greg's reaction and see him slip up.

Britney tells Greg that she wants to get the child's DNA tested to confirm its her father, as Greg stops her and says it's not a good idea. Britney questions child is his, as the latter is unable to answer. Greg soon confirms the truth and states he loves her and they'll find a solution. Britney starts to question him on why he slept with her sister, as he states he she is very mature. She gradually grows angry and Benson decides they have enough evidence and has them move in. Britney is livid by Greg's action and stabs him in the cheek for making her sister lie on their father and making her kill him. The detectives bust in, with Fin taking the bleeding and pleading Greg away and Benson consoling Britney.

While walking by the pier, Stone tells Benson that Greg subsequently took a plea deal of 25 years for his crimes of statutory rape and conspiracy to murder. Benson is pleased by the news and Stone says the Moore sisters will go to counseling but Benson believes that all the help in the world will not help. Benson soon gets a message that reveals Rollins had her baby, much to their delight.

Cast[]

Main cast[]

Recurring cast[]

Guest cast[]

References[]

Quotes[]

Benson: So what are we looking at, Detective?
Sam Williams: Male perp was average height, weight. Maybe white, maybe black, in a ski mask.
Carisi: What about a doorman?
Sam Williams: Nope, no doorman.
Benson: [noticing a circular mirror in a corner] What about cameras?
Sam Williams: Still checking, but don't hold your breath.
Williams: Victim was stabbed in the jugular with a kitchen knife. Perp left the weapon.
Benson: The girls?
Williams: Traumatized, in shock. They're with a neighbor 'til the ambulance arrives.
Benson: There's no mother in the picture?
Williams: Apparently not.
Sam Williams: [to Carisi and Benson] You deal with kids all the time. I don't know how you do it.
Carisi: Sometimes I don't either.
Benson: Um, Britney, Laura? I'm Olivia and this is Sonny, and we're here to help you.
Britney Moore: You need to help my little sister.
Benson: We will, honey, we're gonna... we're gonna get you to the hospital as soon as the ambulance gets here, okay?
Laura Moore: I just wanna go home and stay with my daddy.
Britney Moore: Daddy's dead. Tell her. He's dead.
Fitz: Attend the tale of Douglas Moore. Allegedly, he walks in on the assault, fights back, gets killed.
Tutuola: That's what the daughters told us.
Fitz: I have three problems with that. Number one, there's no defensive wounds.
Carisi: So he didn't put up much of a fight?
Fitz: If any at all. Problem number two, the stab was shallow. Any adult with wherewithal would put pressure on the wound, call 911.
Tutuola: But he didn't?
Fitz: No, he didn't. He didn't have wherewithal, which leads me to problem number three. I found undigested wine in his stomach and a whopping blood alcohol level.
Tutuola: So he could have been passed out.
Fitz: At the very least, extremely drunk.
Carisi: Maybe he went to the bar before he came home.
Tutuola: Or the daughters aren't telling us the whole story.
Tutuola: The lab says the wine in the bottles in the kitchen matches the wine in the glass.
Carisi: Yeah, and the saliva from the glass matches samples taken from Doug Moore.
Tutuola: So he was home drinking. Crap.
Carisi: He bled out on the couch, right?
Tutuola: Well, he just so happened to fall straight back after he was stabbed.
Carisi: Or he was already on the couch. Crap. So, the perp smashed the window, undid the latch from the inside.
Tutuola: Yeah.
[climbing onto the fire escape, Carisi closes the window and tries to reach the latch through the hole]
Carisi: Nope. Look, the angle from this hole to where that latch is, that's not humanly possible.
Tutuola: Crap.
Benson: [to Britney] There's just some things that don't make sense.
Britney Moore: I don't care. You know why? 'cause my father's dead. Okay, my father is dead. So I... I don't really understand what difference it makes who killed him.
Benson: Britney, I can see that you're an honest person, but if you're trying to protect someone or you're afraid of someone... we can help you.
Britney: Nobody can help me.
Benson: What does that mean, honey?
Britney: I had to.
Benson: You... you had to what?
Britney: I had to protect my sister from my own father. My own father was raping my sister. I had to kill him.
Benson: What's gonna happen to them now?
Alexis Farrow: Uh, the girls will spend the night in custody at the ACS facility. I'm assuming, given the circumstances, the D.A. will be open to a plea.
Benson: Okay, we'll be in touch.
Tutuola: So now what?
Benson: We vet the story. Laura told us that she tried to disclose to the neighbor, Greg Callahan.
Carisi: We met that guy. We'll follow up.
Rollins: And I'll have the lab run the father's DNA against Laura's rape kit.
Benson: And check the bed sheets, the towels, and the clothes in the hamper.
Benson: Fin, everything okay?
Tutuola: We just heard back from Doug Moore's boss. They had a staff meeting every Thursday from 3:00 to 6:00. Doug led it. Never missed one.
Benson: So he couldn't have been home sexually abusing his 13 year old daughter.
Rollins: Who puts chickpeas in tuna salad?
Carisi: [at the hospital with Rollins] You doing okay?
Rollins: Just don't leave me.
Carisi: I'm not going anywhere.
Tutuola: Rollins is fine. Turns out the baby's not coming any time soon.
Benson: She's not in labor.
Tutuola: Not yet. They're keeping her at the hospital for observation. Carisi's there and Dr. Al.
Benson: What could possibly go wrong?
Tutuola: Dr. Al proposed.
Benson: What?
Tutuola: She said she'll think about it.
Benson: Is the lawyer right?
Stone: Yeah, we can't talk to the girls without their guardian's consent.
Benson: Okay, they may have plotted to murder their father.
Tutuola: Greg Callahan's involved. Is anybody still buying his "nice-guy-next-door" act?
Stone: Any evidence to indicate otherwise?
Benson: The only ones who can tell us more are the girls, who we can't talk to as long as he's their legal guardian.
Stone: So what you need to do is find a way to challenge the guardianship itself.
Izzy Budnick: That's Doug Moore.
Carisi: That's the guy who signed the deed of guardianship?
Izzy Budnick: That's right.
Carisi: Does this guy not look a little young to be a 50-something father with two teenage daughters to you?
Izzy Budnick: Well, he had a photo ID and he had his daughters' IDs. He paid with a credit card. What... why would somebody lie about that?
Al Pollack: [to Rollins when she turns down his marriage proposal] I'm disappointed, but one of the only good things about getting older is that you get used to it. I'm glad I met you, Amanda, that we made a baby together. Um, I'll always be grateful.
Rollins: Thank you, Al. Thank you.
Pollack: Now let's have this baby already. What do you say?
Pollack: Amanda, I want to take care of you.
Rollins: I know you do. Um... the thing is, Al, I can't marry you.
Pollack: Why not?
Rollins: I don't love you.
Tutuola: You lied to those girls, you lied to the court. Did you think you could get away with that?
Benson: Stone says that he can charge kidnapping, but unless the girls testify, it's gonna be tough to convict.
Carisi: So this guy does a year for forgery? Come on. He had something to do with this murder. We got to talk to Britney. We got to talk to Laura again.
Tutuola: They won't turn on him. He's probably been grooming them for years.
Benson: So get me evidence of that.
Benson: Laura, we need to talk.
Laura Moore: Greg said we didn't have to.
Benson: Well, it's not up to Greg. [looks at the book Laura is reading] Shakespeare. It's... it's pretty grown-up stuff.
Laura Moore: I am grown up.
Benson: Well, good, because... because I have a grown-up question. You said that you love Greg.
Laura Moore: I meant like a brother, family.
Benson: Did Greg tell you to say that? Because I know that you two are reading "Romeo and Juliet" together.
Laura Moore: He helps me with my English homework.
Benson: But I saw the inscription. You are Juliet and he's Romeo. So you two are in love.
Laura Moore: You think I'm too young to be in love.
Benson: No, not at all. Not with someone your own age.
Laura Moore: Juliet was 13. My mother, she killed herself. I'm not like other girls playing with baby dolls. I am a real woman.
Laura Moore: Juliet fell in love with someone who she wasn't supposed to. We're star-crossed lovers even when it hurts because that's what people...
Benson: Who love each other do? Laura, I know that it wasn't your father who had sex with you. I know that it was Greg.
Laura Moore: I would never betray him.
Benson: Honey, but he betrayed you.
Laura Moore: He wouldn't do that.
Benson: But he did. He told us that he was in love with Susan.
Laura Moore: No. You... you're wrong. Susan doesn't even have a ring on her ringer.
Benson: That's not what love is.
Laura Moore: How would you know? You don't have a ring either.
Laura: Juliet fell in love with someone who she wasn't supposed to. We're star-crossed lovers even when it hurts because that's what people...
Benson: Who love each other do? Laura, I know that it wasn't your father who had sex with you. I know that it was Greg.
Laura: I would never betray him.
Benson: Honey, but he betrayed you.
Laura: He wouldn't do that.
Benson: But he did. He told us that he was in love with Susan.
Laura: No. You... you're wrong. Susan doesn't even have a ring on her ringer.
Benson: That's not what love is.
Laura: How would you know? You don't have a ring either.
Benson: [to Britney] Greg didn't care about Susan. He was after your sister. He manipulated her. He convinced her that she was in love with him. He even went so far as to propose to her.
Britney Moore: He asked her to marry him?
Benson: Yes.
Britney Moore: It's that stupid ring. That's why she's been so happy.
Benson: What did she say? What... what did she tell you?
Britney Moore: That, um, that me and her and Greg, we were gonna all live together, you know, and everything was gonna be okay. And then she'd just been been babbling on about, like, this "Romeo and Juliet" stuff, which I... oh, my God. What did she do? What did I do?
Benson: This isn't your fault or Laura's. This is one person's fault and that's Greg, and we will make sure that he never hurts you or your sister again.
Greg Callahan: What did Laura tell you? She... look, you know how she makes things up.
Tutuola: [watching a surveillance feed] Son of a bitch.
Benson: The undercovers are close by?
Tutuola: A booth away. She'll be okay, Liv.
Britney Moore: She showed me the ring. The one you gave her.
Greg Callahan: Okay, yeah, I got her a ring. It was just to make her feel better.
Britney Moore: Did you ask her to marry you?
Greg Callahan: What? No, of course not.
Britney Moore: So you're calling Laura a liar.
Greg Callahan: She lives in a fantasy world. Look, just hang in there, Britney. I'm gonna get guardianship back, and we're all gonna live together. You, me, and Laura.
Britney Moore: And the baby?
Greg Callahan: What?
Britney Moore: Look, I think Laura's pregnant.
Benson: We didn't tell her to say that.
Tutuola: She's going off-script, winging it. You want me to stop this?
Benson: No. No, let's... let's give her a minute.
Greg Callahan: Help me! I'm bleeding!
Tutuola: Shut up! She should've killed you, you're under arrest.
Rollins: She's early, but she's healthy. Thank god.
Carisi: You did great, Rollins. She's... she's so beautiful.
Rollins: Thanks.
Tutuola: What's her name?
Rollins: Billie.
Carisi: Billie? Nice.
Rollins: Yeah.
Carisi: Jesse and Billie. You like your new sister, Jesse?
Jesse Rollins: I love her!

Background Information and Notes[]

  • The title of the episode is from the last lines of the play Romeo and Juliet. The play is mentioned in the episode several times.
  • Three delete scenes from this episode were posted on Youtube:
    • Rollins talks to Benson about the case, but starts to have an issue with the baby, leading Benson to send her home. [1]
    • Carisi talks to Benson about Rollins condition and how he left her at the hospital with Dr. Al Pollack. Benson mentions that he and Rollins seem to have gotten close and reminds Carisi she was very close to her former partner, Elliot Stabler, though not mentioning his name. [2]
    • Benson talks to Rollins about Dr. Al proposing to her at Al's apartment.[3]
  • Britney Moore was born on February 22, 2004 (making her 15) and her younger sister Laura was born on October 6, 2006 (making her 13). Zoe Margaret Colletti, the actress who plays Britney, was born on November 27, 2001 while Laura's actress Talitha Eliana Bateman was born on September 4, 2001. This makes the two actresses at least 17 years old at the time, albeit two months apart.

Episode scene cards[]

1 2 3

697 West 140th Street
Monday, January 14

Office of
The Chief Medical Examiner
421 East 26th Street
Tuesday, January 15

Apartment of
Greg Callahan
697 West 140th Street
Wednesday, January 16

4 5 6 7

Family Court
Part 41
Thursday, January 17

Law Offices of
Izzy Budnick, Esq
909 8th Avenue
Thursday, January 17

ACS Facility
163 West 125th Street Thursday, January 17

Square Diner
33 Leonard Street
Friday, January 18

Footnotes[]

  1. ↑ Benson Sends Rollins Home - Law & Order: SVU (Deleted Scene)
  2. ↑ Rollins Is on Carisi's Mind - Law & Order: SVU (Deleted Scene)
  3. ↑ Benson Gives Rollins Advice About Marrying Al - Law & Order: SVU (Deleted Scene)
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