Game (Season 6, Episode 14)
Premise: An escort’s murder copies a scene from a violent video game, and the teenagers behind it claim they could not tell play from reality.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 6, Episode 14
- Starring
- Det. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), Det. Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni), Det. John Munch (Richard Belzer), Det. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola (Ice-T), 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)
- Guest stars
- Seth Gabel as Garrett Perle, Trisha LaFache as Louise Karnaki, Barry Bostwick as Oliver Gates, Matthew Faber as Stuart Davis, Mam Smith as Melody Quinn
- Director
- David Platt
- Writers
- Patrick Harbinson
Summary
“Game” opens with a young woman found beaten to death on a SoHo sidewalk after a car ran her down and her attackers stripped her and took her purse. The anonymous 911 call is traced, through a fingerprint on a payphone, to Det. Tony Nasreddin, who is working undercover with the Joint Terrorism Task Force. His lieutenant, Katie Moore, lets SVU hear a wiretap on condition that it is never used in court: the victim, escort Melody Quinn, was on the phone with her boss, Eddie Shah, when a young voice picked up and mocked him. With Benson away at a homicide course, Fin works the case with Stabler, and Melody’s clients check out.
Stabler’s young son Dickie sees the crime-scene photos and recognizes the attack from NtenCity, a game in which players run down women and beat them for cash. Huang doubts that games alone produce killers. The designer calls the scene a hidden extra, and Munch finds a new downloadable version adding the torn clothing, a detail never made public. Its programmer, Stuart Davis, was paid by an emailer later traced to Larry Tauber, whose car hit Melody. Tauber is then found dead, a drunken suicide after a night at a strip club with a younger friend. Warner finds Melody was stomped in stiletto heels, TARU brings out a female voice on the tape, and Tauber’s phone records lead to 17-year-old Louise Karnaki. Blood on her boots prompts her to name her boyfriend, Garrett Perle, who wipes his hard drive as he is arrested.
Garrett’s lawyer, Oliver Gates, pleads insanity, blaming the game and Tauber, and Louise’s family hires an expensive firm, which Novak believes Garrett’s family is paying for, ending hopes of a deal. The U.S. Attorney’s Office removes the wiretap, saying it no longer exists. Huang finds Garrett a thrill-seeking narcissist who knows right from wrong, but on the stand he concedes that games are addictive and can train players to kill by reflex. Garrett testifies that he thought he was still playing, urged on by Tauber. TARU then recovers a self-deleting email, calling Tauber a murderer, that Garrett paid Davis to send him two hours before his death, and under Novak’s cross-examination Garrett says it was all a joke to him.
Spoiler, the ending: In closing, Gates argues the game left the teenagers unable to control themselves; Novak answers that people get ideas everywhere and that Melody’s death was real. The jury finds Garrett and Louise guilty of second-degree murder. At home, Stabler asks Dickie to put down his hockey game so they can just talk.
Why it stands out
- Barry Bostwick guest stars as defense attorney Oliver Gates.
- Seth Gabel and Trisha LaFache play the teenage couple on trial.
- Benson is mostly absent, away at a homicide course, so Fin partners Stabler.