Quarry (Season 6, Episode 13)
Premise: The remains of a boy missing since 1980 point to a death-row child molester, but the truth lies with a boy he abused.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 6, Episode 13
- Starring
- Det. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Det. Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni), Det. John Munch (Richard Belzer), Capt. Donald Cragen (Dann Florek), ADA Casey Novak (Diane Neal), Dr. George Huang (BD Wong), ME Dr. Melinda Warner (Tamara Tunie), CSU Ryan O’Halloran (Mike Doyle), TARU Ruben Morales (Joel de la Fuente), Judge Lena Petrovsky (Joanna Merlin)
- Guest stars
- Michael Shannon as Avery Shaw, John Savage as Lucas Biggs, Terry Serpico as Deacon Brinn, Angelica Torn as Julia Brinn, Kathryn Rossetter as Vivian Tate
- Director
- Constantine Makris
- Writers
- Jose Molina
Summary
“Quarry” begins when an old missing-child flier for Jeffrey Ronsen, a seven-year-old who vanished in 1980, reaches Benson with a photo of a Queens ballpark marked with an X. The squad had suspected Lucas Biggs, a ballplayer who preyed on boys and now faces execution in Virginia for a child’s kidnapping and murder. Ground radar turns up the boy’s remains, still in his baseball jersey, and Warner says his neck was probably broken. Stabler leaves when his son Dickie goes to the hospital with suspected appendicitis. At the funeral, Benson speaks with Avery Shaw, a teammate who later reported seeing Biggs with Jeffrey, and Deacon Brinn, the 13-year-old neighbor who was babysitting Jeffrey and sent him home alone that night.
In Virginia, Biggs denies killing Jeffrey or sending the photo. His former girlfriend, Vivian Tate, once the Ronsens’ housekeeper, has been cashing his pension, and her arrest leads to a storage locker filled with caps taken from boys he molested. Threatened with their destruction, Biggs names each owner, Deacon among them. Huang explains why Deacon has kept silent. Confronted, Deacon admits Biggs abused him, says he sent the photo and claims he saw Biggs bury Jeffrey. The Ronsens ask that the execution go ahead. Then Deacon is found on train tracks, but O’Halloran matches his fingerprint to gum stuck to Jeffrey’s jersey, and Warner finds he was shot before the train hit him.
Threatening letters in Deacon’s apartment show someone was stalking him. Biggs tells Benson that a younger boy, Avery, used to follow Deacon around. Avery’s apartment is full of material on Deacon, and on Benson, and his childhood diaries describe Deacon getting the boys drunk, raping Avery, breaking Jeffrey’s neck when he fought back and making Avery help bury him. Through Kimber Faulk, the mother of the infant son he left, the detectives find Avery, who confesses to shooting Deacon and tries to plead guilty at his arraignment. But Deacon had been secretly recording himself abusing boys with a hidden camera in his apartment, and the camera also caught Avery confronting him and leaving him unharmed.
Spoiler, the ending: The footage also shows Deacon leaving with a gun after a call from his wife, Julia. She admits their son, Zeke, told her his father had touched him; she took Deacon’s gun, made him drive to the tracks and shot him. Avery says he confessed out of guilt for staying silent and left his son for fear of becoming an abuser, and Benson tells him he is not a monster. Biggs is executed just after midnight. Benson tells Stabler she worries about the genes she carries, and he answers that loving your children is what counts.
Why it stands out
- Michael Shannon plays Avery Shaw, and John Savage plays death-row inmate Lucas Biggs.
- Fin does not appear; Ice-T is credited only.