Out of Control (Season 2, Episode 8)
Premise: A sophomore’s rape accusation against two fraternity brothers runs into a wall of silence and questions about her own past.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 2, Episode 8
- Detectives
- Sgt. Phil Cerreta (Paul Sorvino), Det. Mike Logan (Chris Noth)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Ben Stone (Michael Moriarty), ADA Paul Robinette (Richard Brooks), DA Adam Schiff (Steven Hill)
- Guest stars
- Noelle Parker as Andrea Fermi, Carolyn McCormick as Dr. Elizabeth Olivet, Mark Kiely as Ted Campion, Danny Zorn as Joel Holder, David Burke as Gary Burnham
- Director
- John P. Whitesell II
- Writers
- Story: David Black & Robert Stuart Nathan; Teleplay: Jack Richardson
Summary
The Investigation
In “Out of Control,” university sophomore Andrea Fermi stumbles into a street after a Halloween party at the Theta Phi fraternity house and tells police she was raped by several men. She was very drunk, and her memory is patchy, but she names two brothers, Ted Campion and Joel Holder. The fraternity insists its members never went upstairs, and her former boyfriend, a Theta Phi pledge named Gary Burnham, paints her as an unstable ex who threatened to ruin his life.
Cerreta and Logan keep working through the guest list. A bartender remembers Andrea drinking heavily and leaving with a man in an animal costume, and a graduate student’s wife saw Joel Holder and another man on the stairs, one of them saying “she’s there.” A guest in a Snoopy costume admits he helped Andrea upstairs and later saw Holder carry her back into a room. DNA testing links Campion to Andrea, though the result for Holder is weaker. Both are charged with first-degree rape.
The Trial
The defense files a defamation suit against Andrea and claims she wanted sex with the fraternity. Gary, promised he won’t be charged if he tells the truth, says Andrea told him she was willing. Then a former fraternity president recalls Gary saying he should have warned her. Faced with charges himself, Gary pleads to a lesser count and testifies that he saw Campion and Holder have sex with Andrea while she was barely conscious, and that he walked out when it was his turn.
Andrea testifies about what she can remember. The defense then reveals she slept with a former boyfriend the night before the party. Stone shows the jury that she always insisted on protection, which suggests she never agreed to unprotected sex with the defendants.
Spoiler, the ending: The jury acquits both Campion and Holder of rape. Andrea leaves the courthouse feeling the jury has put her on trial instead, and Stone tells her the system let her down.
Why it stands out
- A rare outright loss for Stone, delivered by a jury that seems swayed by the victim’s history.
- The fraternity’s code of silence is broken only when a former president decides the house’s reputation matters less than the truth.
- Dr. Olivet explains to the detectives how a victim can be disbelieved because she doesn’t fit the expected image.