Equal Rights (Season 12, Episode 18)
Premise: When a Wall Street analyst is gunned down on his way to the ferry, the trail runs past a collapsed tech stock to his wife, who says years of beatings drove her to have him killed.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 12, Episode 18
- Detectives
- Det. Lennie Briscoe (Jerry Orbach), Det. Ed Green (Jesse L. Martin)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston), ADA Serena Southerlyn (Elisabeth Röhm), DA Nora Lewin (Dianne Wiest)
- Guest stars
- Karen Young as Leslie Cooper, Brian O'Neill as Russell Woods, Angelica Page as Georgina Woods, Bob Dishy as defense attorney Larry Weaver, J. K. Simmons as Dr. Emil Skoda
- Director
- James Quinn
- Writers
- Terri Kopp
Summary
The Investigation
“Equal Rights” opens with stock analyst John Cooper of Dreisner Investments found shot twice near the ferry terminal, his wallet missing but his costly watch untouched. A rare cigar in his coat leads to a cigar bar receipt and then to Peter O’Mann, a criminal lawyer who lent Cooper $50,000 through a commuters’ poker game. O’Mann says he met Cooper that night as his attorney and cites privilege, and his prints do not match a partial found on a shell casing.
The SEC had been looking at Cooper for keeping a strong buy rating on Everson Technologies as the company sank, and Everson’s CFO, Justin Brenner, admits promising Cooper that his firm’s underwriting fees were safe. A colleague notes that Cooper never warned relatives to sell, and his brother-in-law, Russell Woods, lost nearly $200,000 on the stock. Woods’s fingerprint matches the partial on the casing, and he is arrested.
The Trial
Southerlyn notices that Cooper’s widow, Leslie, seems more upset about Woods than about her husband. Phone records show about 30 calls between them and a call from Woods’s cell, near the scene, to Leslie on the night of the murder. Confronted with her sister Georgina present, Leslie admits she asked Woods to do it, offering him part of a $1 million insurance payout, and says her husband beat her for 15 years. Woods pleads guilty to second-degree murder and Georgina to an accessory charge.
Defense attorney Larry Weaver produces hospital records and photos of injuries, and the judge allows a battered woman defense. Lewin wants the case to go away, but Leslie turns down 15 to life. Dr. Emil Skoda says she does not fit the textbook syndrome. At trial her son testifies that his father hit his mother, and Leslie says her husband threatened to kill her a week before she turned to Woods. McCoy’s cross stresses her earlier divorce filing, her failure to call police and the insurance money.
Spoiler, the ending: The jury finds Leslie Cooper not guilty. Her lawyer hails the verdict as a victory for battered women; McCoy calls it an invitation to hire a killer, Lewin points out that the jury saw a woman beaten repeatedly, and Southerlyn worries it casts women as helpless.
Why it stands out
- Bob Dishy appears as defense attorney Lawrence “Larry” Weaver.
- McCoy and DA Nora Lewin split over whether to try the case, with Lewin fearing that an acquittal would invite the defense in future murder-for-hire cases.
- The defendant is acquitted even though she admits arranging her husband’s killing.