White Lie (Season 11, Episode 18)
Premise: The execution-style killing of a cocaine dealer and his wife leads detectives to an Army officer’s wife who has been carrying drugs from Colombia on military flights.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 11, Episode 18
- Detectives
- Det. Lennie Briscoe (Jerry Orbach), Det. Ed Green (Jesse L. Martin)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston), ADA Abbie Carmichael (Angie Harmon), DA Nora Lewin (Dianne Wiest)
- Guest stars
- Charlotte d’Amboise as Caryn Wyman, Michael Gaston as Jim Wyman, Louie Leonardo as Joe Pena, Jordan Lage as Buddy Marks, Ruben Santiago-Hudson as Mr. Winters
- Ripped from the headlines
- The story draws on the case of Laurie Anne Hiett, who smuggled cocaine while her husband, Col. James Hiett, was overseeing the U.S. anti-drug effort in Colombia.
- Director
- Don Scardino
- Writers
- Richard Sweren & Aaron Zelman
Summary
The Investigation
“White Lie” opens with Daniel and Rosa Alvarez shot in the back of the head with a small-caliber gun in their apartment, and his left ear cut off. A bag holds cocaine residue and $40,000 is hidden behind the dishwasher. The doorman let up a ponytailed man calling himself Joe an hour before Alvarez came home carrying a brown overnight bag. Alvarez’s nephew Tito says his uncle drove him to the East Side heliport for a big pickup, but he lost his nerve and went home.
A heliport worker saw a blond woman get into Alvarez’s black Jaguar, and flight records show a helicopter arriving from McGuire Air Force Base. The passenger was Caryn Wyman, wife of an Army major posted in Colombia, who says she came for an aunt’s funeral but cannot back up her account of a car service. Fellow officers’ wives describe expensive shopping and a drug-related hospital visit, and a hotel valet recalls the Jaguar’s driver guarding her bag. Her husband, Major Jim Wyman, presses Van Buren for details, and Briscoe and Green arrest Caryn at the funeral with cocaine in her pocket.
The Trial
Through her lawyer, Buddy Marks, Caryn claims a one-time run for her gardener, Fernando Vercal, for $10,000. After McCoy persuades a Colombian diplomat to make Vercal available, he reveals she has made deliveries to Alvarez roughly every other month for a year. Caryn then admits a ponytailed man came to her hotel with Alvarez’s ear and ordered her to bring him eight kilos. Over her husband’s objections, she agrees to a sting in exchange for probation and witness protection, and Joe Pena is arrested at the heliport collecting the drugs.
At trial, the doorman and a second witness back away from identifying Pena, and Lewin raises a plea deal. Caryn testifies but then slips away from her police escort, scaring her husband, before resurfacing. On cross-examination, defense attorney Winters attacks her addiction, her lenient deal, and her smuggling on Army flights while her husband oversaw anti-drug programs. On redirect she says the major has resigned his commission because of her.
Spoiler, the ending: The jury convicts Pena on two counts of first-degree murder. Federal marshals take the Wymans into witness protection, and their new location is withheld even from the prosecutors.
Why it stands out
- The story echoes a real scandal in which the wife of the U.S. Army colonel heading the American anti-drug campaign in Colombia smuggled cocaine.
- As an officer’s wife traveling on military aircraft, Caryn is never searched, which makes her an ideal courier.
- With both eyewitnesses backing off at trial, the murder case rests on an admitted addict and smuggler testifying under a deal.