Episode
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit: Desperate
Overview
After a young boy witnesses the brutal sexual assault and murder of his stepmother, he is too terrified to tell the detectives who attacked her.
Details
- Series
- Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
- Season
- Season 4
- Episode
- Episode 18
- Air date
- 2003-03-14
- Runtime
- 43 min
Episode context
Desperate is Episode 18 in Season 4 of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. It aired on 2003-03-14. The runtime is 43 min.
Previous / Next
Episode 17: Privilege
A young female film student dressed in a maid's uniform has apparently committed suicide but it's very suspicious. The detectives learn that she just broke up with her very rich and powerful boyfriend.
Episode 19: Appearances
The body of a nine-year-old beauty pageant contestant is found raped and murdered on a bus, but the case goes beyond the killer when it leads detectives to a virtual-pornography website.
More episodes from this season
Episode 16: Tortured
A Tibetan woman who was tortured in her home country is found murdered, with her foot missing, and after an exhaustive search of potential suspects, the killer is a victim of torture himself.
Episode 20: Dominance
A quadruple homicide with sexual overtones is just the start of an intense rampage of a serial killer that brings a homicide detective into the mix. As the entire squad races against time to prevent further victims, the evidence uncovers a horrible situation of incest and abuse.
Episode 15: Pandora
The brutal rape, and subsequent death, of a female motorist turns out to be an undercover FBI informant acting as a cyber vigilante for catching online pedophiles to capture the predator trafficking internet porn. The detectives find the victim's husband murdered and follow the trail of evidence for the latest victim she had been tracking, which turns into an international case of teenage prostitution, with ties to the Czech Republic.
Episode 21: Fallacy
A female party-goer and rape victim claims self-defense after killing her attacker. Events take an unusual turn when they find out that the victim is a pre-operative transgender.
Episode 14: Mercy
When the body of a 1-month-old baby girl is found stuffed inside a cooler, the detectives are horrified. But they soon learn that the baby had a genetic disorder known as Tay-Sachs disease, and it may have been a mercy killing.
Episode 22: Futility
A man accused of raping several neighborhood women denies everything and represents himself in court.
Episode 13: Rotten
In their investigation of a prisoner's death, Benson and Tutuola learn that he was sexually assaulted before being incarcerated and since it happened while in custody, the police are suspected.
Episode 23: Grief
A dead girl is found outside a bar. The death, however, is ruled a suicide, because the victim's boyfriend continually raped her. The victim's father vows revenge against his daughter's rapist.
Episode 12: Risk
An infant ingests pure cocaine disguised in baby formula, uncovering a complicated narcotics ring with unlikely participants and the entire squad goes undercover to flush them out.
Episode 24: Perfect
A murdered 14-year-old girl leads the detectives to a prominent physician who specializes in reproduction therapy and exposes a dangerous "foundation" where disenfranchised young women are brainwashed.