Girls Disappeared (Season 16, Episode 1)
Premise: A teenage witness to the murder of Noah’s mother leads SVU into a Mexican trafficking ring that starts killing anyone who might talk.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 16, Episode 1
- Starring
- Sgt. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Det. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola (Ice-T), Det. Nick Amaro (Danny Pino), Det. Amanda Rollins (Kelli Giddish), Det. Dominick “Sonny” Carisi Jr. (Peter Scanavino), ADA Rafael Barba (Raúl Esparza)
- Guest stars
- Manny Perez as Angel Perez, Laura Gómez as Selena Cruz, Lobo Sebastian as Joaquin Menendez, G.K. Umeh as Little Tino, Alexa Mansour as Luna Garcia
- Director
- Alex Chapple
- Writers
- Story: Warren Leight & Julie Martin; Teleplay: Robert Brooks Cohen & Kevin Fox
Summary
“Girls Disappeared” finds Benson fostering baby Noah and still looking for whoever ordered the death of his mother, Ellie Porter, a trafficked girl who was gang-raped and then burned. Her pimp, Little Tino, took the blame, but the squad doubts he gave the order. In Queens, Amaro, now a patrol officer, catches a man with a 16-year-old, Luna Garcia, in a parked car. She turns out to be a witness in Ellie’s murder, and as detectives bring her in, a gunman, Diego Ramirez, opens fire outside the station and is wounded. His prints match a gas can from the murder scene. New detective Dominick “Sonny” Carisi Jr., a Staten Island transfer studying law at night, gets Luna talking by promising her special status for trafficking victims, a move Benson tells him her squad does not make.
Luna points them to the house where she works. Benson sends Amaro, known for having beaten a suspect, to pose as a corrupt officer with the man who runs it, Joaquin Menendez; he tips Joaquin off to a raid and is put on retainer. The raid turns up young girls, among them Missy Brooks, a teenage mother. All the girls ride with a car service, Quickride, whose owner, Angel Perez, says he once cut off Little Tino’s account. When Barba visits Tino at Attica, Tino hints that Noah is at risk. Within hours Tino is stabbed in prison, Diego is killed in his hospital bed, Missy is shot dead in a client’s car, and a gunman fires near the playground where the nanny, Lucy, has Noah; no one is hit. To protect Amaro’s cover, Benson has him arrested along with Joaquin.
Tino’s mother points them to Selena Cruz, the enforcer who breaks in new girls, and a sting leads to her arrest. Luna says Selena was taken from their Mexican village as a child and brought to Tenancingo, a trafficking center. A federal task force names the owner of a mansion there, Teodoro Juarez, who lives in New York as Angel Perez. Selena, serving two days on a plea deal, is shown a photo of her son, Miguel, inside that mansion. She agrees to testify and says Angel let anyone do whatever they wanted to Ellie.
Spoiler, the ending: With signed statements from Selena, Tino and five trafficked girls, the squad arrests Angel at home while his mother is arrested in Tenancingo. Angel threatens Noah, the arrest turns into a struggle, and Fin shoots him dead as his wife screams. Selena is reunited with Miguel, and Benson tells Noah the man who hurt his mother will never hurt anyone again.
Why it stands out
- Season 16 premiere: Peter Scanavino joins as Det. Dominick “Sonny” Carisi Jr., recurring for the first few episodes before becoming a series regular with “Pornstar’s Requiem.”
- Picks up after the Season 15 finale, with Amaro working traffic stops in Queens and Benson fostering Noah, Ellie Porter’s son.
- Scanavino had appeared once before on the show, playing a different character in the Season 14 episode “Monster’s Legacy.”