Martin Gold was a therapist and the founder of A Sheltered Place, a group counseling center for troubled adolescents. It was revealed Gold manipulated them with lies and delusions, assimilating them together through drug dealing and coercing the girls into statutory sexual assault.
Background[]
Gold had an esteeming background as a veteran of the Persian Gulf War, and once retiring, he opened his center to the public, attracting wealthy and notorious clients by seeking them out through their children in need of help. Behind the facade of counseling and group therapy, Gold oppressed the children under a devoted hive mind for the sake of worship and gratification. To keep the reinforcement going, the kids would regularly be supplied drugs to meet their addictions, including addict Enzo Cook, as well as forcing himself on the girls, all under the guise of "therapy" and referring to it every time as "conquering their fears", even to their parents. Gold did this to A.J. Dunne, a girl with a rebellious streak who was twisted by Gold to believe her father "molested" her. This was merely for exploiting her through raping her in private under the guise of a confrontation with an imaginary "abuse" Gold made up. Cook witnessed this and doctored a photo at the center to send to Dunne's parents in hopes of starting an investigation, but this failed to arise much alarm and suspicion.
Users[]
Gold set up an arrangement to further abuse Dunne at a motel, where she would be waiting in a room under a fake name for a man interested in statutory sex, Ramsey Vickers. It goes awry when Vickers gets so aroused Dunne's orally and vaginally raped while being strangled to death, not even saving herself from biting Vickers' penis. The squad is led to Gold when her parents tell conflicting stories about Gold's work, her mother calling him a "godsend" and her father calling him a "lying prick" for the lies about him whispered in A.J.'s ear. The detectives go to question Gold at one group session and immediately get a hint of his grandiose narcissism when he winks at them during the session. Huang also figures out his narcissism in profiling him, and after tracking the fake name and finding and arresting Dunne's rapist/murderer, they all realize Gold was responsible for endangering her.
Gold is placed under arrest during a session all the parents attend, including politicians in ranks above the team. But without much evidence glaringly implicating Gold and Cook going into withdrawal reducing his credibility, Gold is released and he returns to the center. Huang oversteps in the name of justice by rescuing Cook from Gold's watch, where he's already stoned again. Smuggling Cook to Mexico, Huang works with an underground to administer an ibogaine treatment legal in that country to send Cook into a trip that drains his cravings and reactive withdrawals to drugs. In a sting operation, Cook is recruited by the team to return and "beg" Gold for more drugs, which is a success despite Gold's feelings of "betrayal". Cook pulls out his wire and the detectives arrest Gold. However, Gold sneers Cook will use again but Cook confidently retorts he's cured and doesn't need control freaks like Gold and planned to testify to ensure he rots in jail. Gold then threatens Huang with a report outside his legal duties in America, but Huang proudly says he filed his own report and lost his license for 30 days, ending the proclamation with "it was worth it". Gold is taken away in cuffs in shock.
He was later found guilty of drug distribution, statutory rape, sex trafficking, and reckless endangerment in Dunne's rape and murder and successfully imprisoned. (SVU: "Users")