Enemy (Season 15, Episode 10)
Premise: A massacre at a Washington Heights heroin stash house that kills three prep school girls leads to an Afghan warlord who claims his work for the U.S. military shields him.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 15, Episode 10
- Detectives
- Det. Joe Fontana (Dennis Farina), Det. Ed Green (Jesse L. Martin)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston), ADA Serena Southerlyn (Elisabeth Röhm), DA Arthur Branch (Fred Dalton Thompson)
- Guest stars
- Christopher Maher as Qaadar Khaleel, Dylan Baker as defense attorney Sanford Rems, Samrat Chakrabarti as Hydar Raheem, Bryan Scott Johnson as Captain Clark Wallace, Sandor Tecsy as Arten Bardha
- Director
- Richard Dobbs
- Writers
- Alfredo Barrios Jr.
Summary
The Investigation
“Enemy” begins with a massacre at a heroin stash house in Washington Heights: four dealers and three prep school girls are shot dead, and a fourth girl, Sabina Montgomery, survives an overdose. Some of the dealers once robbed another stash house, and the heroin left behind is high-grade product from Afghanistan. A classmate, Felicia, says the girls met the dealers at a Chelsea rave, and Hugo, a contact at the rave, links them to the crew of dealer Sammy Santiago.
Santiago turns up in his apartment, beaten on the soles of his feet and strangled. A call from the office of gravel dealer Arten Bardha, DNA on a cigarette butt and Sabina’s identification tie Bardha to both crimes. Facing eight murder counts, he says he was hired by Hydar Raheem, an importer whose heroin Santiago had stolen after being offered a distribution deal.
The detectives follow heroin hidden in religious icons from the airport to Raheem’s Manhattan import store. Raheem names his boss, Afghan drug lord Qaadar Khaleel, who is visiting New York, and wears a wire to a ride in a car with diplomatic plates. On tape, Raheem reports that Santiago and his crew have been dealt with, and Khaleel calls it excellent. He is arrested outside a restaurant on 12th Street and claims diplomatic immunity.
The Trial
Khaleel holds no diplomatic post; the car belongs to the Afghan consul, whose driver chauffeurs Khaleel because his brother serves in Khaleel’s militia. Defense attorney Sanford Rems says the recording violated the Vienna Convention, and State Department official Edwin Blitzer asks Branch to go easy on an ally against the Taliban and al Qaeda. Branch refuses, and the judge admits the tape, ruling that the treaty bars searching such a car but not an informant’s recording. Khaleel rebuffs an offer of 50 years to life.
Rems raises a public authority defense, arguing that the U.S. enlisted Khaleel and that running his drug trade kept his cover, and produces a letter from his Special Forces handler, Captain Clark Wallace. Raheem testifies that Khaleel wanted the thieves killed but concedes he never said so outright. Wallace says Khaleel supplied fighters but denies knowing about his heroin business. Khaleel testifies that American forces tolerated his opium trade, but under McCoy’s cross he will not choose between denying the murders and claiming U.S. authority for them.
Spoiler, the ending: The jury finds Khaleel guilty of eight counts of first-degree murder. Afterward the prosecutors discuss “blowback,” the unintended consequences of American policy in Afghanistan, and expect more cases like this one.
Why it stands out
- The defense raises a public authority defense, arguing that the warlord’s work with U.S. Special Forces covered his drug trade.
- The key recording is made inside a car with diplomatic plates, and the court rules that the Vienna Convention protects such cars from searches but not from an informant’s wire.
- Alexandra Daddario and Gina Rodriguez appear in small roles, as Felicia and Yolanda.