The Accuser (Season 26, Episode 18)
Premise: A welding shop owner is found sexually assaulted with a date carved into his back, and the investigation uncovers his abuse of a teenage apprentice and a girl whose case against him failed two decades earlier.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 26, Episode 18
- Starring
- Capt. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Sgt. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola (Ice-T), Det. Joe Velasco (Octavio Pisano), Det. Terry Bruno (Kevin Kane), Capt. Renee Curry (Aimé Donna Kelly), ADA Dominick “Sonny” Carisi Jr. (Peter Scanavino)
- Guest stars
- Caleb Malis as Sam Carson, Todd A. Horman as Eddie Upshaw, Carolyn Fagerholm as Angela Jones, Erik Palladino as Nate Carson, Kate Middleton as Jenny Upshaw
- Director
- Martha Mitchell
- Writers
- Story: Gabriel Vallejo & Nicholas Evangelista; Written by: Andrea Ciannavei
Summary
“The Accuser” opens at a welding shop, where owner Eddie Upshaw sends his employee, Carl Hess, home and works late alone. That night Nate Carson brings his 17-year-old son, Sam, who has just quit his apprenticeship, to collect his last paycheck and apologize, and Sam finds Eddie beaten unconscious and sexually assaulted with an object. Someone has used an angle grinder to cut a date, June 15, 2001, into his back. Sam says he spent the evening with his girlfriend, Allie Solano, but she says she was home by four, and phone records show Eddie called Sam ten times that night without an answer. With his father present, Sam will say only that he was sitting in Tompkins Square Park.
Dr. Evan Klein tells Fin and Bruno the carving was made to leave a lasting scar. Eddie says he never saw his attacker, that the date means nothing to him and that some attacks have no motive. Jenny, his ex-wife, is just as blank about the date. Sam then asks to meet Bruno alone and tells him Eddie, who began driving him home after he started at the shop at 15, sexually abused him; he fears his father will blame him. A pole camera confirms Sam was in the park. With Benson and Bruno beside him, Sam tells his parents, Nate and Jessica, though he does not want to testify.
Curry finds a sealed 2002 arrest of Eddie for sexually abusing a young girl, and she and Velasco pull the file from a court records warehouse: he was tried in 2004 and acquitted, and the abuse of the eight-year-old Jane Doe began in 2001. Pressed, Jenny insists the girl lied but names her as Angela Jones, a friend of her daughter, paroled on a drug sentence three days before the attack. Eddie rejects the idea that a woman attacked him and calls Angela a liar. When detectives come to her door, Angela escapes down the fire escape, and Curry catches her in the street.
Spoiler, the ending: Benson has Angela’s handcuffs removed and, with Carisi, tells her she believes her. Angela admits the attack, says she feels no guilt and describes Eddie as having marked every day of her life since. Sam tells Bruno he has an appointment with a therapist and asks whether he will grow up wanting to hurt people. Carisi offers Angela a plea to second-degree felony assault: she stays on parole and completes a psychiatric program, after which the plea may be withdrawn and the charge reduced or dismissed. Her lawyer, Kingston Giddens, accepts. Any case against Eddie for abusing Sam is not resolved on screen.
Why it stands out
- Bruno, the detective Sam confides in, is played by Kevin Kane, promoted to series regular this season after two recurring seasons.
- Juliana Aidén Martinez is credited as Det. Kate Silva but does not appear.