Last Dance (Season 23, Episode 5)
Premise: The founder of a dating app is strangled in Central Park before dawn, and prosecuting one of the richest men alive for her murder sets McCoy’s office against the mayor in an election year.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 23, Episode 5
- Detectives
- Det. Jalen Shaw (Mehcad Brooks), Det. Vincent Riley (Reid Scott)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Nolan Price (Hugh Dancy), ADA Samantha Maroun (Odelya Halevi), DA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston)
- Guest stars
- Rob Benedict as Scott Kelton, Tawny Cypress as defense attorney Erin Grassley, Bruce Altman as Mayor Robert Payne, Jeremy Gabriel as Jordan Payne, Audrey Lynn Weston as Dr. Shannon Andrews
- Director
- Alex Hall
- Writers
- Rick Eid & Pamela Wechsler
Summary
The Investigation
“Last Dance” opens before sunrise on a Central Park path, where a runner chats briefly with a woman and later finds her dead. She was strangled, with no sign of sexual assault. Park worker Miguel Lopez, seen near the body, flees the detectives and is caught with her necklace, taken, he says, after she died. Its engraving identifies Veronica Knight, creator of the dating app Loba. Her sister, Allison, mentions a new psychiatrist, Dr. Shannon Andrews, who will not discuss her patient.
Lopez recalls a white man in a cap with an orange letter, and video and a doorman point to a regular predawn runner in a black cap with an orange P. Guessing Princeton, the detectives sift local alumni down to Scott Kelton, a tech billionaire. Kelton says he heard a scream, called 911 and saw a coffee vendor nearby; Veronica once worked for him, and he ignored her recent requests to talk. The vendor, Matt Walsh, has a sexual-assault conviction and a fresh scratch. Then the detectives learn Veronica was sexually assaulted six years earlier and meant to confront her attacker, and Kelton is arrested.
The Trial
McCoy, up for reelection, appears at the press conference on the charge with Mayor Robert Payne, a Kelton beneficiary who later warns him privately. Defense attorney Erin Grassley casts the case as revenge, since Kelton backs McCoy’s opponent. The prosecution calls Walsh to preempt any effort to blame him; he says Kelton once paid for his lawyer and skipped his usual coffee that morning, but Grassley dwells on his record. Andrews, citing her other patients’ fears, refuses to testify and wins a motion to quash.
Plea talks open. In a proffer, Kelton calls their long-ago encounter consensual and says that when Veronica demanded an apology and threatened a police report, he pushed her, she hit her head on a rock, and he choked her. No deal results. Andrews’ notes place the alleged assault at a St. Barts retreat; a flight manifest leads to the mayor’s son, Jordan Payne, who was there with a woman not his wife and refuses to help. Over scotch, the mayor urges Price to accept five years and threatens him if Jordan is subpoenaed. McCoy rejects the pressure but removes Price and tries the case himself.
Declared hostile, Jordan Payne is confronted with a worried text he sent Veronica and admits Kelton spoke of her with contempt; Grassley exposes his affair. McCoy closes by tying his oath of office to the jurors’ duty.
Spoiler, the ending: Kelton is convicted of second-degree murder. McCoy then tells Price he has resigned: the mayor would defeat him and punish his staff, while stepping down now lets the governor appoint someone with integrity.
Why it stands out
- Sam Waterston makes his final appearance as District Attorney Jack McCoy; he is in the main cast for only the season’s first five episodes.
- McCoy takes over the trial from Price, questions the key witness and delivers the closing argument himself.
- McCoy resigns minutes after winning the verdict rather than face a reelection fight against the mayor’s opposition.