Locomotion (Season 15, Episode 24)
Premise: A rush-hour commuter train slams into an SUV parked on the tracks, killing 12, and the man who left it there says he meant to kill only himself, setting up an insanity defense he later throws out.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 15, Episode 24
- Detectives
- Det. Joe Fontana (Dennis Farina), Det. Nick Falco (Michael Imperioli)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston), ADA Alexandra Borgia (Annie Parisse), DA Arthur Branch (Fred Dalton Thompson)
- Guest stars
- Joseph Lyle Taylor as Davey Buckley, Giancarlo Esposito as defense attorney Rodney Fallon, Matte Osian as James Buckley, J.D. Jackson as Lenny Thorne, Peter McRobbie as Judge Walter Bradley
- Director
- Matthew Penn
- Writers
- Story: Roz Weinman; Teleplay: Eric Overmyer
Summary
The Investigation
“Locomotion” opens on a morning commuter train bound for Grand Central that plows into an SUV parked on the tracks in a rail yard, derailing and eventually leaving 12 people dead. The SUV smashed through a service-road gate during a shift change at the monitoring center, wears stolen plates, and its driver has vanished. While a federal task force weighs terrorism, the vehicle is traced to Lenny Thorne, a systems analyst awaiting retrial on rape charges after a hung jury; the prosecutor in that case, ADA Marc Nesoff, rides the same train daily. Thorne, seized in a raid, says his SUV must have been stolen, and a second, unknown set of prints turns up on the steering wheel.
A task-force agent narrows the passengers to eight men with no ticket or shaky stories. At the home of Davey Buckley, a separated construction worker who was treated at the scene, Fontana sees that a fresh cut on Buckley’s wrist came from a blade, not flying glass. Buckley breaks down and gives a videotaped confession without a lawyer, saying he left the SUV on the tracks to end his own life and never meant to hurt anyone. His DNA and prints are in the vehicle.
The Trial
Wary of People v. Payne, a ruling that threw out a depraved indifference conviction after a jury acquitted on intentional murder, the prosecutors charge only depraved indifference murder. Rodney Fallon, defending Buckley for free, files an insanity defense and seeks manslaughter with concurrent 15-year terms, which McCoy and Borgia reject. At trial, a detective says Buckley timed the crash to the shift change and cut himself with a pocketknife to blend in with passengers. A storefront clinic doctor concedes that Buckley saw a different doctor on each of three visits and got only a few days of Haldol for depression, with no follow-up.
As Fallon calls his expert witness, Buckley fires him, drops the insanity plea and represents himself, with Fallon kept on as standby counsel. Through questions he wrote for Fallon to read, Buckley testifies that he expected the train to push the SUV aside and that, picturing his daughter, he tried to drive off but got stuck. McCoy suggests he wanted his estranged wife’s attention. In rebuttal, his oldest brother, James, describes years of drinking and says he fired Davey and paid for rehab; questioning James himself, Davey gets him to admit he refused to help when Davey’s marriage fell apart.
Spoiler, the ending: The jury returns guilty verdicts on count after count of second-degree murder. Afterward, as the prosecutors discuss sentencing, one concedes that the disaster might have been averted had Buckley had health care. No sentence is shown.
Why it stands out
- Michael Imperioli makes the last appearance of his recurring run as Det. Nick Falco; he later returns to the role as a guest star in “Hindsight.”
- The charging decision turns on People v. Payne, cited as a recent ruling that overturned a depraved indifference murder conviction.
- In the middle of trial the defendant fires his lawyer, abandons his insanity defense and ends up questioning his own brother on the stand.