Rhodium Nights (Season 13, Episode 23)
Premise: The death of an underage escort at the police commissioner’s son’s bachelor party draws SVU into a war between two escort bosses with powerful clients.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 13, Episode 23
- Starring
- Det. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Det. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola (Ice-T), Det. Nick Amaro (Danny Pino), Det. Amanda Rollins (Kelli Giddish), Det. Brian Cassidy (Dean Winters), Capt. Donald Cragen (Dann Florek), ME Dr. Melinda Warner (Tamara Tunie), Defense Attorney Marvin Exley (Ron Rifkin)
- Guest stars
- Pippa Black as Carissa Gibson, Peter Jacobson as Bart Ganzel, Brooke Smith as Delia Wilson, Eric Ladin as Clayton Hannigan, Laura Benanti as Maria Grazie
- Ripped from the headlines
- Partly inspired by the rape accusation against Fox 5 New York reporter Greg Kelly, son of then-NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly, which prosecutors declined to charge; the madam Delia Wilson also echoes the alleged “Upper East Side Madam,” Anna Gristina.
- Director
- Norberto Barba
- Writers
- Warren Leight & Julie Martin
Summary
“Rhodium Nights” opens at a penthouse bachelor party that cable news host Clayton Hannigan throws for Will Brady, the police commissioner’s son. Officers answering a noise complaint leave, and later Hannigan and an escort find a girl dead in his bed. Police find her body in the rooftop pool, where Hannigan claims he tried to save her; fleeing guests, among them ballplayers and Secret Service agents, jammed the elevator. Cragen tells the squad to tread lightly. Warner finds no water in the girl’s lungs and a fatal dose of scopolamine, a drug escorts slip to clients, plus semen from several men. Her breast implants identify her as Maggie Murphy, 16, a runaway from foster care in Winnipeg. Before Hannigan reported the death, a woman with a Spanish accent had called 911 about a sick girl.
Will’s footage shows Maggie staggering toward Hannigan’s bedroom and Hannigan heading the same way with a woman. Stopped before he can fly to North Korea, Hannigan admits moving the body so Secret Service agents could take guests out unseen, and names his companion, Carissa Gibson. Carissa, an escort, senses trouble in Amaro’s marriage and flirts with him; at home, his wife, Maria, has told him they must talk. Carissa’s lawyer also represents her booker, Bart Ganzel. At Ganzel’s loft Benson and Amaro meet Brian Cassidy, her onetime SVU colleague, now Ganzel’s muscle and undercover for three years; he punches Amaro to keep his cover. Ganzel says Maggie came with escort Anya Solar, who has fled to Colombia; scopolamine prescribed under one of her aliases is in her apartment. Cassidy says Anya once worked for rival madam Delia Wilson, whose clients include powerful men.
On her farm Delia calls her agency a matchmaking hobby. Photos of Cragen with Lena from his undercover work in “Russian Brides” are slipped under his door, and he says he must recuse himself and SVU. Then a former governor, Fletcher, dies; Iris, who claims to help with his memoir, admits dressing his body to hide that he died during a massage. Warner finds four times the normal dose of an erectile dysfunction drug, plus scopolamine. The masseuse, Yuko Sakura, says she found him dead and called Iris, her booker. Facing obstruction charges, Iris dismisses lawyer Marvin Exley and talks about Delia.
Spoiler, the ending: Delia is arrested for promoting prostitution, and bail is set at $2 million, which Exley covers with his own townhouse. He warns that Delia has dirt on powerful officials and taunts Amaro about Carissa. Carissa later tells Amaro she fears she is next but leaves without giving a statement. That night Cragen wakes with blood on his hands beside Carissa’s body, her throat slit. The case is left unresolved.
Why it stands out
- Dean Winters returns as Brian Cassidy for the first time since Season 1’s “Disrobed”; Benson says he worked at SVU last century.
- The season finale ends on a cliffhanger; showrunner Warren Leight booked many of its guest actors to return for the Season 14 premiere.
- Peter Jacobson and Brooke Smith play the rival escort bosses, with Pippa Black as Carissa and Eric Ladin as Hannigan.