Donald Shalvoy is the former Governor of the State of New York who used to be friends with DA Jack McCoy after he helped him become DA before it was revealed he was corrupt. He was eventually forced to resign by Michael Cutter following a scandal involving his wife committing murder-for-hire.
History[]
Shalvoy is first mentioned granting a full pardon for Ted Sanderson after he is proven innocent of personally killing his wife through DNA evidence. (L&O: "Strike")
McCoy later meets with Shalvoy in his office to help the governor work on his new crime bill. While there, McCoy asks for his help in convincing the Plattsburgh DA to charge Donna Cheponis with fraud for using her daughter Chrissy's identity to steal money from men, in order to help with a murder case that McCoy is prosecuting in Manhattan. While the Plattsburgh DA is reluctant, Shalvoy manages to get him to charge her with criminal impersonation by promising a 10% supplemental appropriation to his budget, an appropriation that was already promised to the mayor of Plattsburgh.
When it is revealed that Donna killed Chrissy, McCoy asks for help again while attending a ball when the Plattsburgh DA is convinced that Chrissy's boyfriend killed her instead. Shalvoy says that would be overreaching but does agree to let the DA know that he is taking a personal interest in the case. Later, McCoy informs Shalvoy that, because of his intervention, Donna was found guilty of ordering the murder of Eric Greenwood, sentenced to 25 years to life imprisonment, and is also being charged with murdering Chrissy in Plattsburgh. (L&O: "Personae Non Gratae")
While investigating a murder tied to an escort service called Excalibur Exclusives, McCoy recognizes Shalvoy's voice from a wiretap, realizing that he is a client and a witness in the murder case. McCoy meets Shalvoy in his office and hands him a non-target letter relating to the investigation. He explains that he knows his secret while telling him that no one else knows yet, but since the escort's story may need to be confirmed, the story may soon get out to the public. McCoy also warns him that the Justice Department seeks to use the witnesses and wiretaps that the police collected to take down Shalvoy for putting several of their colleagues in prison when he was running the Anti-Corruption Task Force. McCoy tells him that he will do his best to deny their request for the wiretaps, and Shalvoy encourages him to run for a full term as DA.
However, Shalvoy later calls the PR firm that handled his campaign, Swann and Poltech, to print a false story against McCoy as a warning to either protect him or forget about running for DA. When McCoy finds out and confronts him, Shalvoy simply threatens him. When EADA Cutter serves him with a subpoena under his alias "Al", Shalvoy angrily confronts McCoy and tells him that he will not have his backing for DA. Shalvoy eventually tells his wife Rita everything, and she agrees to help him cover everything up. To this end, Rita has the murderer, Frank Beezley, accept a guilty plea through his father with a promise to commute his sentence at a later time. After Frank accepts, Shalvoy bribes the Justice Department to drop their investigation with a land lease; has Chanel Barva, the escort, deported to Brazil by ICE; and moves Richie Citrone, Barva's boyfriend, into witness protection. (L&O: "Excalibur")
When Thomas Volchek, a state trooper assigned to the Executive Services Division, is subpoenaed by Cutter and ADA Rubirosa, he meets with Shalvoy and explains that he stole footage of Dargerville Sheriff John Burkhart entering the city to cover up Burkhart murdering his confidential informant William Timmons. Shalvoy tells Volchek that he can assert executive privilege to protect himself and that he will back him. When the DA's office is unable to recover the footage, McCoy confronts Shalvoy about ordering the tapes to be erased. Shalvoy asks if that is what McCoy thinks; he says no, reasoning that, as a smart politician, he would have cut ties with Burkhart and appointed a commission to investigate the use of confidential informants the moment he discovered that Burkhart was dirty. Shalvoy confirms this and reveals the real reason why he told Volchek that he would assert executive privilege: he didn't want McCoy to use his bodyguards to publicly shame him while preparing to run for a full term as DA. Shalvoy then invites him to a dinner honoring Joe Chappell, and McCoy leaves his office.
After a witness in the murder case, Deputy Robbie Linz, commits suicide with the gun used to kill Timmons, thus implying that he killed him, Shalvoy and McCoy discuss the case in the former's office. Shalvoy assumes that is the end of the case, attributing the missing footage to "glitches". McCoy replies that he has called for a blue-ribbon grand jury to investigate the glitches and plans to summon Volchek to the stand as an expert witness, implying to Shalvoy that he will be unimpeded in this since Shalvoy can't assert executive privilege in relation to technical issues. Shalvoy gets the message and has Volchek deliver the missing footage in McCoy's mailbox. As a result, Burkhart is arrested and convicted for murder. Afterwards, Shalvoy holds a press conference afterwards to announce that he is ordering a review of every drug conviction Burkhart took part in and appoints Chappell as the head of a special commission to investigate the use of confidential informants. He later began backing Chappell in his run against McCoy in the DA election. (L&O: "Knock Off")
Shalvoy is later involved in a scandal involving Rita committing murder-for-hire. McCoy uses a grand jury indictment against Shalvoy to leverage him into helping the DA's office take down Rita. However, he refuses to testify against her for the sake of their sons and tries to buy McCoy's silence, implicitly saying that he has damaging information on Chappell that McCoy could use against him during the campaign. When McCoy refuses the offer, Rita claims to McCoy that Shalvoy is framing her so that he can be with his mistresses and that Shalvoy owes her after everything that he put her through during the Excalibur Exclusives case. Once McCoy and the police leave, Cutter privately informs Shalvoy that the police had discovered that the victim Charles Whitley's dark underground world overlapped with Shalvoy's. Cutter provides him with a list of names, dates, and places of his various affairs with escorts. He then offers to let Shalvoy resign with his reputation intact and claim that he was doing so in order to support Rita in a time of personal crisis.
Shalvoy later holds a press conference announcing his resignation, falsely attributing it to Chappell's counsel, and calling the charges against Rita "tenuous and politically motivated". Cutter subsequently admits to McCoy that he had actually bluffed Shalvoy and there was no list. Although McCoy isn't sure if he should approve of his tactics, he accepts it after Rubirosa reminds him that McCoy wants to win the election, which starts in a few hours. (L&O: "The Drowned and the Saved")
Appearances[]
- Law & Order (2 seasons, 4 episodes):