Purity (Season 27, Episode 9)
Premise: After a bombing nearly kills Bruno, SVU traces a surrogacy trafficking ring to a white supremacist community and the multimillionaire buying its embryos.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 27, Episode 9
- Starring
- Capt. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Sgt. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola (Ice-T), Sgt. Amanda Rollins (Kelli Giddish), Det. Terry Bruno (Kevin Kane), Det. Jake Griffin (Corey Cott), Capt. Renee Curry (Aimé Donna Kelly), ADA Dominick “Sonny” Carisi Jr. (Peter Scanavino), Exec. ADA Nolan Price (Hugh Dancy), Det. Theo Walker (David Ajala), Lt. Jessica Brady (Maura Tierney)
- Guest stars
- Tom Lipinski as Joseph Dahlsonn, Colleen Foy as Sara Tandon, Tina Ivlev as Polina Kravets, Greg Germann as Derek Strauss, Nia Vardalos as Minonna Efron
- Director
- Jean de Segonzac
- Writers
- Story: Nicholas Evangelista; Written by: Kevin Deiboldt
Summary
“Purity” continues the joint investigation into Hope Lifts, a sham charity run by Sara Tandon and her husband, Sergey Volkov, that held women from abroad to carry babies for sale. Encrypted messages about buying 400 embryos led the squads to a farm tied to white supremacists, where a bomb goes off; shrapnel tears into Bruno, whose heart stops in the ambulance before medics restart it. Volkov was shot by police, and Tandon now claims he beat her and forced her into the scheme.
Using a name from Stabler, Fin and Det. Theo Walker press an informant in Yonkers, who says Andrew Wells, a white supremacist with a violent record, bought C-4 and rifles. ESU arrests Wells in an Orange County subdivision full of members of the Aryan Nationalist Alliance, many of them pregnant women and blond children, and a costly lawyer ends his interrogation. Every house traces through shell companies to Joseph Dahlsonn, heir to a Norwegian auto fortune, whose firm Supra Genomics screens embryos for rich IVF patients; he admits backing the group but denies any knowledge of explosives. In court, Tandon’s lawyer, Minonna Efron, has all evidence from Hope Lifts’ attorney, Derek Hobbs, thrown out because Lt. Jessica Brady intimidated his 14-year-old daughter, and Tandon makes $20,000 bail.
Records show more than 300 embryos shipped from Hope Lifts to Dahlsonn’s assistant, Brantley Lorenz, who says Dahlsonn kept only white embryos for secret gene-editing work and destroyed the rest. Dahlsonn is arrested, with Derek Strauss as his lawyer. Polina Kravets, one of the rescued women, goes into labor, and Benson helps her through the birth; afterward Polina weighs adoption and fears being sent back to Ukraine. At Tandon’s trial, she describes years of abuse, and the judge threatens Carisi with contempt for raising excluded matters. Strauss offers Dahlsonn’s testimony that Tandon ordered the killing of Nadiya Tecun in return for dropped charges and his embryos, and the DA’s office agrees. Dahlsonn hands over recordings and a Brownsville address, where police find a mass grave of women and babies, and he testifies that Tandon made all the decisions.
Spoiler, the ending: Tandon is convicted of first-degree kidnapping and second-degree murder. Polina and Marya Vereska receive T visas, and Polina names her daughter Daryna. Bruno, back on his feet, jokes with the squad. As Brady sees Dahlsonn out, she tells him the donor families have learned what happened and won an injunction; a judge then rules that the embryos be destroyed, and Strauss files for an emergency stay.
Why it stands out
- It is the second half of a crossover with Law & Order, whose ninth episode of season 25 tells the first part; it also goes by the alternate title “Snowflakes (Part 2).”
- Corey Cott is promoted to series regular as Det. Jake Griffin from this episode.
- Greg Germann returns as defense attorney Derek Strauss, a role he first played in season 14.