Bully (Season 12, Episode 18)
Premise: The death of a wine company’s timid finance chief exposes a CEO who abuses her staff and employees willing to stay silent for a fortune.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 12, Episode 18
- Starring
- Det. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Det. Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni), Det. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola (Ice-T), Dr. George Huang (BD Wong), ME Dr. Melinda Warner (Tamara Tunie), TARU Ruben Morales (Joel de la Fuente)
- Guest stars
- Kate Burton as Annette Cole, Shane McRae as Justin Jennings, David Costabile as Bruce Clarkson, Emily Meade as Corinne Stafford, Michael Siberry as David Watson
- Director
- Helen Shaver
- Writers
- Ken Storer
Summary
“Bully” opens at a gallery show, where a patron named Cindi admires a canvas that turns out to be soaked in blood dripping from the loft above. Upstairs lies Ellen Sazelin, 43, chief financial officer of the wine importer Luscious Grape, her throat cut by a shard from a broken vase and her underwear torn. A neighbor accuses the gallery owner, Andreas, of once trying to assault her, and he has painted with the blood, but an online interview clears him. Phone records show 63 calls to Ellen, including a death threat, from Juan Alvarez, a leather-goods seller who harasses customers to boost his search ranking; he is charged with menacing but was elsewhere that night.
Warner then rules the death undetermined: there is no DNA and no prints but Ellen’s, her blood alcohol was very high, and old bruises, hair she had pulled out and other signs point to months of severe stress. Ellen’s partner, CEO Annette Cole, calls her a sister, and the staff, among them ad chief Bruce Clarkson, Corinne Stafford, top salesman Justin Jennings and wine buyer David Watson, all describe one happy family. After someone breaks into Ellen’s sealed loft, the detectives find a flash drive hidden in a toy panda holding 20 webcam videos of Annette screaming at the staff and berating Ellen. Annette denies it all. Huang likens the staff’s loyalty, rewarded with cars, tuition and bonuses, to Stockholm syndrome, and the detectives learn that a $500 million buyout is pending.
The videos then air on MSNBC, mailed by Ellen before she died, and Annette is ridiculed everywhere; the buyer withdraws, citing a morals clause. At a press conference she curses her customers, the press and the police, fires her whole staff, tells them they made her do it and kills herself. Hardwicke accepts her rant as a confession. But Bruce is run down by Corinne, driving her grandfather’s car, who blames him for ruining their plan: the employees had agreed to keep Ellen from exposing Annette before the sale. Bruce, Ellen’s friend from AA, was sent to talk to her but says he found her dead, and David searched the loft.
Spoiler, the ending: Warner finds rectal cells on the rim of a champagne bottle: the alcohol was given through the back door, bypassing the stomach, to stage a drunken accident. The bottle came from a store near Ellen’s home, not from company stock. Justin, whose mother, a former opera singer, drinks the same way, admits he went to Ellen first, kissed her, was slapped, and pushed her onto the table, where the vase broke and cut her neck. He is arrested for murder while his mother calls for him from the next room.
Why it stands out
- LuAnn de Lesseps of The Real Housewives of New York City plays Cindi, the art patron who finds the bloody canvas.
- MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski and Tamron Hall appear as themselves covering the leaked videos.
- Kate Burton plays Annette Cole, with David Costabile, Emily Meade and Shane McRae as her employees.