Alien (Season 7, Episode 11)
Premise: A Catholic schoolboy’s stabbing leads to an eight-year-old girl with two mothers, and her grandparents use the case to try to take her from the woman who raised her.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 7, Episode 11
- 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)
- Guest stars
- Amy Pietz as Zoe Dunlop, Raquel Castro as Emma Boyd, Mary Beth Peil as Deb Boyd, Stephen Bogardus as James Decker, Daniel Jenkins as Father Justin Miller
- Director
- Constantine Makris
- Writers
- Jose Molina
Summary
“Alien” begins when Sean Hamill, a 12-year-old at St. Victor’s Catholic School, is pushed out of a moving car at Mercy Hospital with a stab wound that leaves him unable to walk. The car belongs to the school priest, Father Justin Miller, who leaves his keys on the visor for parishioners to use. Students point to Charlie Monaghan, a heavyset older boy who beat Sean up a week earlier. Charlie says he was walking his eight-year-old half-sister, Emma Boyd, home, and Emma backs him, but a deli camera shows him alone near the school at 4:02. Bloody scissors from a school dumpster carry prints far too small to be his.
The principal explains that Emma’s mother, Kate Boyd, enrolled her as a single parent. When Kate fell ill with lupus, her partner of ten years, Zoe Dunlop, began attending school events, parents demanded Emma’s expulsion, and the couple sued. Father Justin admits Sean tormented Emma and turns over her ponytail, found in the art room. Emma confesses that Sean called her a dyke, tried to kiss her and cut off her hair, so she stabbed him; Charlie drove Sean to the hospital. The confession is suppressed because Zoe, who never adopted Emma, has no legal standing as her parent. Family court prosecutor Garrett Gillespie insists on an arrest, and a judge places Emma with her grandparents, Deb and Oliver Boyd, rather than Zoe. Novak gives Gillespie school-logged instant messages in which Sean threatened Emma, and he agrees to counseling and anger management, with Emma going home to Zoe.
Then James Decker, the grandparents’ lawyer, accuses Zoe of molesting Emma, pointing to photos of the two in bed; on the day Kate dies, Zoe says the photos record massages a therapist suggested. Emma repeats the claim but calls it a sin rather than describing pain, and the squad concludes her grandmother, who told her Zoe would go to hell, has turned her against Zoe. The grandparents are charged with unlawful imprisonment as a hate crime. At trial, Deb admits that Decker gave her research claiming gay parents are far likelier to molest children and told her to press Emma hard. The judge removes Decker as counsel and declares a mistrial.
Spoiler, the ending: Novak offers the Boyds a plea deal in exchange for testimony against Decker, and they agree. They tell Zoe they only wanted to protect Emma, but Zoe refuses to forgive them for convincing her daughter that she was a child molester. What happens to Decker is not shown.
Why it stands out
- Although it carries the season’s second production code, the episode aired eleventh, on December 6, 2005.
- Raquel Castro plays Emma; a 2011 scholarly article on how the series portrays children discussed the episode, noting that the detectives believe in Emma’s innocence without assuming she always tells the truth.