Thought Criminal (Season 15, Episode 23)
Premise: An online sting leads SVU to a respected photographer who fantasizes about torturing boys and has built a chamber to do it, but the case has no victim.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 15, Episode 23
- Starring
- Sgt. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Det. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola (Ice-T), Det. Nick Amaro (Danny Pino), Det. Amanda Rollins (Kelli Giddish), Lt. Declan Murphy (Donal Logue), ADA Rafael Barba (Raúl Esparza), Dr. George Huang (BD Wong)
- Guest stars
- Joshua Malina as Simon Wilkes, Nia Vardalos as Minonna Efron, Brian Baumgartner as Gordon Montlieff, Welker White as Paula Walker, Laura Benanti as Maria Grazie
- Director
- Adam Bernstein
- Writers
- Story: Julie Martin & Warren Leight; Story & teleplay: Peter Blauner
Summary
“Thought Criminal” opens with an online sting in which the squad poses as a 14-year-old Thai girl called Lucky and draws hundreds of replies. The one confirmed Manhattan user, “Flash,” is payroll clerk Gordon Montlieff, whom Fin and Amaro arrest at work. Murphy wants small cases to lead to bigger ones, and Gordon hands over a tablet that opens a dark-web chat room where a user called “erastes” writes about torturing a boy he watches in the P.S. 27 schoolyard. Barba notes that the site calls itself fantasy, but the squad sets up a meeting.
Erastes is photographer Simon Wilkes. At his gallery opening an undercover detective using the name Howard Jeffries mentions Flash, and over drinks Wilkes talks about money and boys. Gordon adds that erastes watched a live-streamed torture of a boy and proposed finding one nobody would miss. At a meeting with a supposed trafficker, Wilkes cannot afford the $40,000 asked for a boy from Mexico or El Salvador but offers a soundproofed room for a live stream, then shows them a hidden chamber with saws and a chair overlooking the schoolyard. CSU finds no blood but uncovers photos of tortured boys. Benson’s interrogation turns into threats, and Murphy pulls her out; Amaro gets Wilkes talking by claiming he also watches videos as a release. Wilkes’s wife hires attorney Minonna Efron.
Charged with attempted kidnapping and attempted sexual abuse of a child, Wilkes has bail set at $5 million and stays in custody. The photos prove to be doctored, the only DNA in the room is his, and no victim is found. Dr. George Huang, the psychiatrist both sides accept, finds fantasies that have escalated since childhood and compares the chamber to a suicidal person buying a gun. Efron rejects Barba’s no-jail offer. At trial she gets the detectives to concede that no evidence puts anyone else in the room, raises Amaro’s past attack on three boys with a baseball bat, and mocks Huang as a psychic. Wilkes’s ex-wife, Paula Walker, says she made him leave after finding him chatting about letting others abuse her and their six-year-old son, and on cross-examination Wilkes admits he stayed away from his son because of the pictures in his head.
Spoiler, the ending: The jury acquits Wilkes of both charges after less than three hours. Amaro’s estranged wife, Maria, tells him she has accepted a job in Los Angeles and will take their daughter, Zara, and warns that if he fights her in court she will raise things he would rather keep off the record. On a sidewalk, Wilkes starts photographing Amaro and tells him to smile. Amaro attacks him, and uniformed officers arrest Amaro as an ambulance is called.
Why it stands out
- BD Wong returns as Dr. George Huang, his third appearance since leaving the main cast after season 12.
- Joshua Malina plays Simon Wilkes and Brian Baumgartner plays Gordon Montlieff; Nia Vardalos returns as defense attorney Minonna Efron and Laura Benanti as Amaro’s wife, Maria.
- The episode ends on Amaro’s arrest, which carries straight into the season finale.