The Brotherhood (Season 15, Episode 3)
Premise: A member of a white prison gang is executed on the night of his release from Sing Sing, and the corrections officer charged with killing him argues that he had to strike first to protect his family.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 15, Episode 3
- 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
- Gary Basaraba as Officer John Patrick Worley, Giancarlo Esposito as defense attorney Rodney Fallon, Candice Bergen as Judge Amanda Anderlee, Chance Kelly as Kyle Marsden, Vincent Laresca as Feo Ruiz
- Director
- Jean de Segonzac
- Writers
- Story: Wendy Battles; Story & teleplay: Alfredo Barrios Jr.
Summary
The Investigation
“The Brotherhood” begins when an expectant couple find a man shot once in the back of the head on an East Village street. He wears prison-issue shoes and gang tattoos, and the M.E. notes a 9mm contact wound, heavy drinking and a recent skull fracture. He is Billy Trammell, 32, a Brotherhood prison gang member released from Sing Sing that morning after six and a half years for armed robbery. His sister, who lives nearby, says a tattooed ex-con named Frank came looking for him.
Frank Sweeny, Trammell’s old getaway driver, steers the detectives to Trammell’s ex-girlfriend, whose new boyfriend turns out to have been playing poker at Foxwoods all night. A call asking when Trammell would get home came from Sing Sing, where officials blame his skull fracture on Latin King Feo Ruiz. Ruiz says corrections officer John Worley did it, and Brotherhood leader Kyle Marsden agrees.
Superintendent Cooper vouches for Worley, and Fontana resists targeting a career officer without proof. But Worley’s teenage son faces a drug charge the family blames on the gang, Worley’s alibi is shaky, and E-ZPass records put his car in Manhattan that night. A 9mm stolen from a corrections training center where Worley teaches turns up in a sewer, matches the fatal bullet and bears his print, and he is arrested.
The Trial
Defense attorney Rodney Fallon warns that the gang would kill Worley in jail, and bail is set at $100,000. Prosecutors learn of years of threats from Trammell, including photos of Worley’s children taken at school. Marsden tells McCoy and Southerlyn that any contract on Worley is off, since a guard behind bars pleases him more. McCoy offers manslaughter, but Fallon claims justification, likening Worley’s fear to battered-spouse syndrome, and Judge Amanda Anderlee lets the defense reach the jury though the threat was not imminent.
The superintendent concedes Worley never reported a threat, and Ruiz testifies that Worley showed no fear of Trammell. A note left in the gallery threatens the judge if Worley goes free; she refuses to step aside but lets Fallon call Marsden, who will not answer, is held in contempt and makes a veiled remark to her. Worley testifies that Trammell threatened his wife and that a tattooed man approached his 11-year-old daughter at school, so he moved his family to a motel and went after Trammell. McCoy shows that Worley stole the gun months earlier, faced no danger when he fired, and could have had Trammell’s parole revoked by reporting the threats.
Spoiler, the ending: The jury deadlocks and the judge declares a mistrial. As the prosecutors weigh a retrial, Rockland County police report that Worley’s wife is missing.
Why it stands out
- Candice Bergen guest stars as Judge Amanda Anderlee, who keeps the case after a note threatening her life is left in her courtroom.
- Giancarlo Esposito plays defense attorney Rodney Fallon, who wins the right to argue preemptive self-defense against a gang member who posed no imminent threat.
- A Brotherhood leader serving five consecutive life sentences is held in contempt on the stand after refusing to say whether he authorized Trammell to kill Worley.