Good Faith (Season 17, Episode 17)
Premise: A biology teacher turns up dead in a torched church, and the born-again parent accused of killing him claims he acted to protect his daughter from divine punishment.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 17, Episode 17
- Detectives
- Det. Ed Green (Jesse L. Martin), Det. Nina Cassady (Milena Govich)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston), ADA Connie Rubirosa (Alana de la Garza), DA Arthur Branch (Fred Dalton Thompson)
- Guest stars
- Jeffrey Donovan as Jacob Reese, Sarah Ramos as Mary Reese, Tovah Feldshuh as defense attorney Danielle Melnick, Eric William Morris as Luke Thornton, Denise Dowse as Judge Nora Glover
- Director
- Sam Weisman
- Writers
- David Slack
Summary
The Investigation
“Good Faith” opens with the fifth church arson in a week, but this time a body lies in the burned sanctuary. Rodgers finds that the man, identified from a partial print as teacher Charles Nash, died of skull fractures before the fire started. Nash taught biology and coached basketball at Christian Path Academy, whose team had played at the church that evening.
A dented SUV leads Green and Cassady to college students Jason Ward and Todd Barton, who admit setting the first four fires while high on cocaine but deny the fifth. The lab backs them: the fifth fire used turpentine, not gasoline. Parent Jacob Reese says he and Nash had settled a dispute over the F Nash gave his daughter, Mary, for a paper arguing for intelligent design.
Another parent points the detectives to a group, led by Claudia Murphy, that wanted creationism taught and clashed with Nash. Reese signed its petition, Mary’s grade was never changed, and her alibi for her father falls apart. His phone was used near the church that night, and a search of his home turns up turpentine, which he says he uses to restore furniture. He is charged with murder and arson.
The Trial
At arraignment Rubirosa cites a flyer made on Reese’s computer warning that those who teach evolution will burn, and bail is set at $500,000. Guidance counselor Luke Thornton claims Mary once said Nash made advances toward her, which she denies. Danielle Melnick takes over the defense with a justification claim: Reese killed Nash to shield Mary from divine retribution, believing the lessons on evolution put her life in danger.
Judge Nora Glover lets the theory reach a jury, so McCoy seeks a 730 exam of Reese’s fitness to stand trial. Reese testifies that he saw his late wife’s leukemia as punishment for her adultery, and Mary insists he is not insane. The psychiatrist’s early view is that Reese is devout but competent. Mary also says she came home from her counselor on the day of the murder, though Thornton said she had stopped seeing him months before. Rubirosa learns that Thornton paid for Mary’s visit to a women’s clinic and that both took the same antibiotics, and he admits a sexual relationship with the teenager.
Spoiler, the ending: Mary admits that when her father found her pills and demanded a name, she blamed Nash to protect Thornton, so Reese killed the wrong man. McCoy tells Reese that sparing Mary means pleading guilty to every charge, and he names a sentence of 25 years to life; there is no trial verdict. Melnick tells McCoy she had the right principle but the wrong client.
Why it stands out
- This is Tovah Feldshuh’s final turn as defense attorney Danielle Melnick on the original series, a role she began in 1991.
- The defense rests on a novel justification claim: that killing the teacher saved the defendant’s daughter from divine punishment, which leads McCoy to challenge the defendant’s competency to stand trial.
- Melnick invokes United States v. Ballard, the Supreme Court ruling that courts may not judge the truth of religious beliefs, to argue that Reese’s faith cannot be put on trial.