| "Girls Disappeared" | ||
|---|---|---|
| ← | SVU, Episode 16.01 | → |
| Production number: 16001 First aired (US): 24 September 2014 First aired (UK): 19 October 2014 First aired (CAN): 24 September 2014 First aired (AUS): 9 February 2015 | ||
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| Teleplay By Robert Brooks Cohen & Kevin Fox Story By Julie Martin & Warren Leight Directed By Alex Chapple | ||
Summary[]
The SVU takes on a dangerous prostitution ring to find Ellie Porter's killers.
Plot[]
It's been four months since Benson began fostering Noah, the Baby Boy Doe whose sex worker mother, Ellie Porter, was brutally gang-raped and murdered. Despite the tragic circumstances, Benson is enjoying motherhood immensely and her love for the boy further motivates her to find Ellie's killer.
After last season's fight that nearly cost him his shield, Amaro has been relegated to traffic duty with a new partner, rookie Officer D'Bora Maresko. The pair busts a john getting serviced by an underage girl named Luna Garcia. While being questioned, Garcia smacks Maresko and flees in terror, yelling "He'll friggin' kill me!" When Amaro catches up with her and tries to discern whom the "he" is, an SUV with a QuickRide car service logo on the window drives by and a woman glares at them from the back seat.
Back at the precinct, the team learns that not only is Luna underage, she's a material witness in the rape-homicide of Ellie Porter. As Fin and Rollins walk Luna to the car to take her to SVU, gunshots ring out and a car window shatters! Fin returns fire, and in the commotion, the shooter, Diego Ramirez, runs into the street and is clipped by a passing car. He rolls off the hood to find Fin with a gun to his temple.
At SVU, the squad meets their newest member, Detective Dominick "Sonny" Carisi Jr., a boyish-looking loudmouth from Staten Island sent to fill in for Amaro. He wants to take a run at Luna, but Benson puts him in his place. Luna claims she doesn't know Ellie, but after Carisi bluffs that he can pull some strings to get her T nonimmigration status to protect her from her pimp, she gives up the address of the house she worked out of. The plan is to stake out the house and send in an undercover to infiltrate the ring. They go with someone with a known gripe against the NYPD... Amaro.
While watching the house, Amaro pulls over Joaquin Menendez for running a red light, promising he'll forget the ticket if Joaquin gives him info on the ring. Joaquin is suspicious, so Amaro proves himself by warning him that the house will be raided that night.
That night, SVU busts the house and finds a number of illegal Mexican girls, as well as Missy Brooks a 14-year-old-girl. They also find Joaquin, whom Fin lets walk after he name drops Amaro. Joaquin immediately calls up Amaro, thanks him for the favor and puts him on retainer. The setup worked.
The problem is, Missy refuses to talk. Rollins notices her cell background photo is of an infant and tells Missy that they raided a house back in May and found kids inside. She asks her where her baby is. TARU also goes through the trafficked girls' phones and finds they all have the QuickRide app.
At the QuickRide offices, Fin and Rollins meet with owner Angel Perez, who admits the company has had problems in the past with drivers shuttling around working girls, whose rides were paid for by an offshore shell corporation. Five months earlier he had to close the account of Tino Aguilar, aka Little Tino, the pimp Ellie worked for, for being rough with young girls in the cars.
Turns out the girls in Tino's house also used QuickRide, paid for by a similar shell corporation. Benson heads to Attica to meet with ADA Barba and Little Tino to confirm her theory that Tino and Joaquin share the same boss. Tino is afraid to talk, and when Benson presses him again about Ellie's murder, Tino says she shouldn't be so worried, considering she got a baby out of it. He threatens Noah's safety and hints that there are dirty cops working against her.
Speaking of Amaro, he meets up with Joaquin again to collect his payment and to inform Joaquin that Benson and the DA are leaning on Little Tino. Joaquin better start talking if he doesn't want to be left out in the cold. But it looks like Joaquin does more than that...
In Attica, Little Tino gets shivved by three inmates and ends up in surgery, lucky to be alive. In the Bellevue prison ward, an orderly plunges a syringe into Diego's neck, killing him. In a car in Queens, Missy and a john are found shot to death. Benson calls Lucy, Noah's nanny, to tell her to stay inside, only to find she's at the DeWitt Clinton Playground with Noah. Suddenly Benson hears shots fired over the phone. She races to the playground to check on Noah's safety, and luckily no one was hurt.
Amaro confronts Joaquin, who denies any involvement. Just then, Rollins and Fin burst on the scene and arrest both men. Joaquin maintains dirty cop Amaro set him up.
Meanwhile, Benson and Carisi head back to the QuickRide offices, only to find they have been ransacked. Angel yells at them to leave, saying the vandalism occurred because he talked to the other detectives.
Benson and Fin go to the Attica hospital ward to speak with a now-conscious Tino, but are intercepted by his mother, Almina Aguilar. Benson demands to know who ordered Ellie's killing, and Almina reluctantly admits that while she doesn't know who Tino's boss is, she does know his bottom, Selena, who breaks in the new girls. She tells them to book a date with a girl named Carmen on Craigslist to find Selena.
At a seedy hotel, Carisi poses as a john and waits for Carmen to arrive. He gets aggressive with her and she runs to the bathroom to call Selena. Moments later, Selena and her driver arrive and put a gun to Carisi's head, but Benson, Fin and Rollins take them down.
In the interrogation room Selena refuses to talk, and her lawyer claims she's just as much of a victim as the other girls and was trafficked herself. But Benson doesn't see her as a victim; to her, she's the woman who put her son's life in danger.
The detectives meet with Luna again, who admits she and Selena are from the same village in Mexico, where girls are frequently kidnapped and forced into prostitution. Back in Vargas, everyone knows Selena - she was one of the first girls taken to Tenancingo, Mexico, the epicenter of narco sex trafficking.
Turns out the Federal Task Force is already onto Tenancingo, a poor village made up of shacks except for a few gated mansions where the traffickers rape the kidnapped girls, get them pregnant, and keep the babies as hostages. Barba shows the team passport photos of the men believed to own the mansions, one of whom is Teodoro Juarez. The team recognizes him as Angel Perez, and realizes he staged the QuickRide office vandalizing. With the new info, Barba says they can get Selena to talk.
With the trafficked women still refusing to talk, Benson realizes the way in is through their children back in Tenancingo. They'll give up everything to save their babies, just like Benson would. She and Rollins show Selena a photo of her son Miguel, who is living in Angel's Mexican mansion. Wanting to see him again, she agrees to cooperate, divulging details about Angel's organization while also revealing he green lit Ellie, leading to her death.
Armed with signed statements from Little Tino, Joaquin, six trafficked girls and Selena, the squad goes to pick up Angel at his Staten Island home. When they try to arrest Angel, he threatens Noah, elbows Fin and pulls a gun on Benson... until Fin shoots him dead.
Outside the gates of Rikers, Selena is released and reunited with her son Miguel. Benson watches, moved. She later goes home to Noah, cradles him in her arms and whispers to him that his mother's killer will never hurt anyone again.
Cast[]
Main Cast[]
- Mariska Hargitay as Sergeant Olivia Benson
- Danny Pino as Police Officer Nick Amaro
- Kelli Giddish as Detective Amanda Rollins
- Ice-T as Detective Odafin Tutuola
- Raúl Esparza as A.D.A. Rafael Barba
Recurring Cast[]
- Peter Scanavino as Detective Dominick Carisi, Jr.
- Gavin-Keith Umeh as Augustino Aguilar a.k.a. Little Tino
- Emma Greenwell as Ellie Porter (flashback only)
- Michael Kostroff as Defense Attorney Evan Braun
- Laura Gomez as Selena Cruz
- Jayne Houdyshell as Judge Ruth Linden
- Bronwyn Reed as Lucy Huston
- Sara Contreras as Alminia Aguilar
- Bradley and Skyler Dubow as Noah Porter (uncredited)
Guest Cast[]
- Manny Perez as Angel Perez
- Lenny Venito as John Gatto
- Lobo Sebastian as Joaquin Menendez
- Amina Robinson as Officer D'Bora Maresko
- Alexa Mansour as Luna Garcia
- Chelsea LJ Lopez as Missy Brooks
- Maria Rivera as Carmen
- Ciara Renèe as Mira Perez
- William Oliver Watkins as Uni
- Angel Romero as Miguel
- Cara D'Adamo as Agent Suarez (uncredited)
- Grace Loretta as Teenage Girl (uncredited)
- Larry Nuñez as Diego Ramirez (uncredited)
- Jeremy Sample as Selena's Driver (uncredited)
References[]
Quotes[]
- Carisi: They shot at cops right outside the station? So, they want us to know they're crazy.
- Benson: You must be my new detective.
- Carisi: Dominick Carisi Jr. Call me Sonny. I brought zeppoli.
- Benson: I asked for an experienced, emphatic detective and... and they send you?
- Carisi: I'm way experienced, sensitive and moody too. And I can do that whole empathy thing.
- Rollins: Where are you from?
- Carisi: Uh, Staten Island SVU for two months, Brooklyn for almost a month and then Queens last week.
- Benson: So they love you wherever you go, Carisi?
- Carisi: Call me Sonny. I was supposed to start tomorrow, but I heard about the shooting over the scanner, so I came in.
- Carisi: [to Luna Garcia] How long you been on the streets? One year, two? Six months before that, you're in Mexico getting turned out. You have any hope left? You still praying to our lady of Guadalupe every night, asking her forgiveness?
- Benson: What are you, an immigration lawyer?
- Carisi: Halfway there. Night school, Fordham Law. I just did a term paper on "T" non-immigrant status. She's a good candidate.
- Benson: So you did a paper and now you told her that you have pull?
- Carisi: It doesn't actually matter if I'm actually telling the truth. I mean, I got her to believe I am.
- Benson: Look, that may work in Staten Island, but that's not how we do things here, okay?
- Carisi: My apologies, sergeant.
- Little Tino: Why are you so worried about that dead whore? It worked out pretty good for you.
- Benson: Excuse me?
- Little Tino: I heard you got a baby out of it.
- Benson: Where did you hear that?
- Little Tino: You love that little baby?
- Barba: Are you stupid enough to threaten a sergeant's family in front of a DA when he's offering you a deal?
- Alminia Aguilar: [to Fin and Olivia] Oh, hell, no. You're not going in to see my son.
- Benson: This is police business, Ms. Aguilar, okay? Step aside.
- Alminia Aguilar: Like hell. You set up my baby. He talks to you again, he's dead.
- Tutuola: He didn't talk and they already tried to kill him. You want to keep him alive, tell us who his boss is.
- Alminia Aguilar: I don't know.
- Benson: I guess there's nothing else to talk about.
- Selena Cruz: She's my cousin. I was trying to help.
- Rollins: Yeah, save it, sister.
- Barba: Everyone hates guys like Angel. When it turns, it turns fast.
- Benson: [to Noah] I got good news, sweetheart. The man that hurt your mama is never, ever gonna hurt anybody again. It's over. It's okay now. I love you.
Background information and notes[]
- First appearance of Peter Scanavino as Dominick "Sonny" Carisi.
- The case involving Ellie Porter is solved with all those involved arrested or killed.
- The Quickride offices had a picture with founder Angel Perez with former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg.
- The song that plays during the montage of killings of witnesses against the prostitution ring and the drive-by-shooting at the park where Noah and Lucy were outside is "Gangsta" by Kat Dahlia.
- When Angel is shot there's blood on the car door, meaning the bullet went all the way through his body. However, there is no bullet hole or damage to the door.
Episode scene cards[]
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Quickride Office |
Attica Correctional Facility |
Hospital Wing |
Richmond Hill Motor Lodge |
Rikers Island |
| Previous episode: "Spring Awakening" |
"Girls Disappeared" Law & Order: Special Victims Unit Season 16 |
Next episode: "American Disgrace" |