Davis Langley is a billionaire and a patient for Parkinson's disease, the condition eating at his nerves progressively for several years as he got older. Hearing about the research into stem cells of Dr. Graham Mandell, who lost his father to the same disease, Langley funded his research immensely and agreed to be a test subject.
The acquisition of stem cells involved the illegal inseminations of comatose women with Langley's sperm before terminating their children to obtain the babies' cells and implant the needed genetic markers in Langley's brain to reverse the disease. When the procedures were found out by SVU, Mandell and colleague Dr. Garrison were charged and put on trial.
Langley refused to testify for the prosecution but suddenly appeared for the defense. he told his daily symptoms and even showed the bag he wears that he pees into, all while having tremors on the stand. When cross-examined by prosecution, he says he knows he has a greater chance to die, but the violations of rights and ethics in the research could save millions of lives in the future and pleas being the test subject is crucial for a greater medical good.
The jury acquits Mandell and Garrison with slaps on the wrists and, to the shock of comatose victim Stephanie Rawley's parents, Langley files for custody of the baby, whose umbilical cord contains an abundance of stem cells that genetically match Langley's. (SVU: "Waste")