Shotgun (Season 20, Episode 10)
Premise: A Spanish Harlem tax preparer in his late sixties becomes a folk hero after gunning down three would-be robbers, but the detectives learn the holdup was meant to scare him into selling a valuable building, and McCoy asks a grand jury to charge him with murder.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 20, Episode 10
- Detectives
- Det. Cyrus Lupo (Jeremy Sisto), Det. Kevin Bernard (Anthony Anderson)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Michael Cutter (Linus Roache), ADA Connie Rubirosa (Alana de la Garza), DA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston)
- Guest stars
- Elliott Gould as Stan Harkavy, Armando Riesco as Gregory Cardenas, Jack Carpenter as Max Purcell, John McMartin as Julian Hayworth, Michael Rivera as Angel Colon
- Director
- Roger Young
- Writers
- Richard Sweren & Julie Martin
Summary
The Investigation
“Shotgun” starts at a storefront tax office in Spanish Harlem, where owner Stan Harkavy fires an unregistered pump shotgun at three young men who burst in demanding money and start kicking his assistant, Gregory Cardenas. Two of them, Duane Jefferson and Pierre Hobbs, die, and Angel Colon is badly wounded. Their accounts match, the dead men have records, and the DA’s office declines to charge Harkavy, whom Bernard befriends.
Colon, a would-be corrections officer with no record, knew Cardenas from a karate school, where the two came to blows over Alicia Rodriguez, now pregnant by Colon. She says Colon joined for a box of gold coins said to be hidden in the office. From his hospital bed, Colon says Jefferson promised him money even after hearing there were no coins. Jefferson’s brother leads detectives to Max Purcell, a trust-fund gambler who borrowed through Jefferson, and Cardenas recalls that a man named Max had tried to buy Harkavy’s building.
Purcell’s grandfather, Julian Hayworth, has pledged his estate to Hudson University for a library honoring his late daughter, and the planned site runs through Harkavy’s building; Purcell hoped to own it and force a payoff. Charged with attempted robbery and felony murder, he wins dismissal for lack of proof tying him to the robbers. Jefferson’s second phone leads to a hair salon on Harkavy’s block, where workers say Harkavy chased Purcell outside, spotted Jefferson and retreated.
The Trial
Shown blood-spatter evidence that Jefferson, not the man kicking him, was shot first, Cardenas admits Harkavy coached him to say otherwise. Harkavy insists he never saw Jefferson, but a commercial real estate broker says Harkavy already knew the university’s expansion would make his building worth far more. McCoy concludes that the lie shows consciousness of guilt and sends the case to a grand jury, while Purcell agrees to plead guilty to attempted extortion for five years.
Before the grand jury, Purcell testifies that he paid Jefferson $8,000 to stage a fake robbery and that Harkavy saw Jefferson outside. Harkavy describes building his business with his late wife and denies seeing Jefferson, but he cannot explain why he shot Jefferson before the armed man who was kicking Cardenas. Meanwhile, commentator Len Pewls accuses McCoy of liberal bias, and McCoy fires back.
Spoiler, the ending: After about four hours, the grand jury votes no true bill. Harkavy takes the university’s offer for his building and plans to move to a condo in Palm Beach. Told that he passed up a chance to come clean, he replies that his visitor should talk to him in 40 years, then greets a mother who has brought her son to meet him as a hero.
Why it stands out
- Elliott Gould guest-stars as Stan Harkavy, a neighborhood accountant turned reluctant folk hero.
- The case never reaches a trial jury: McCoy sends it to a grand jury, which refuses to indict.
- Van Buren’s cancer storyline continues as she waits for medical test results.