Law & Order Season 25 Episode Guide
Plot summaries for the twenty-fifth season of Law & Order, which aired on NBC from September 2025 to May 2026, featuring Det. Vincent Riley, Det. Theo Walker, Lt. Jessica Brady, Executive ADA Nolan Price, ADA Samantha Maroun and DA Nicholas Baxter.
Season 25 recap
The first suspect of Season 25 is a prosecutor. “Street Justice,” aired in September 2025, picks up hours after Carter Mills’s acquittal, with Mills shot dead and ADA Samantha Maroun admitting she set out armed, then turned back and threw her .38 into the East River. A lawyer who had left Mills is charged instead and takes a plea. Det. Jalen Shaw has moved offscreen to Brooklyn, so Det. Vincent Riley works for Lt. Jessica Brady without a regular partner until David Ajala arrives in “Guardian” as Det. Theo Walker, new to homicide from Narcotics. Exec. ADA Nolan Price and Maroun try the cases for DA Nicholas Baxter over 21 episodes ending in May 2026.
Hard calls divide the office. Price’s girlfriend, psychiatrist Grace Hall (Kerry Bishé), is forced to testify against her teenage patient in “Hindsight” under the duty to warn. In “Parasite” the office drops its case against a toy magnate’s young bride mid-trial when Maroun argues it rests on contempt for her past. Baxter opens his re-election campaign in “Bend the Knee” by defying Washington over a diplomat’s son claiming immunity, then forces a plea over Price’s head and loses his donors. In “Beyond Measure,” reportedly inspired by the Louvre robbery, he trades a lighter sentence for a stolen crown’s return.
The squad has troubles of its own. Riley’s brother, Matt (Ryan Eggold), testifies in “Brotherly Love” after being stabbed and ends the hour in a coma. Walker’s solo habits strain the partnership, and “New Normal” explores his undercover past. Riley’s car kills a utility worker in “Fate’s Cruel Joke,” and he admits lying to justify the crash. A crossover about trafficked Ukrainian surrogates breaks off in “Snowflakes (Part 1)” after a blast injures SVU’s Det. Terry Bruno, to continue on that show. With Price recovering from surgery, Maroun beats her former mentor in “Ride or Die.”
Politics returns in the finale, “Liberty.” A vice admiral is pushed to his death during Fleet Week, and the trail runs through naval bribes to the nominee for Secretary of Defense. Anthony Edwards plays Judge Kenneth Sullivan, who keeps ruling for the defense and turns out to have asked for the case. Baxter prepares to go after him, but Price makes a deal on his own: a criminally negligent homicide plea that could free the nominee within a year, saying a fight with the judge would have cost them both.
Episodes
- 1
Street Justice
Hours after Price fails to convict Carter Mills of murdering a young model, Mills, who is also suspected of killing Maroun’s sister, is shot dead in the street, and the first suspect is Maroun.
- 2
Hindsight
When a 10th-grade boy is stabbed in Central Park, the trail leads to the girl whose doctored nude photo he shared, and Price’s case comes to depend on her psychiatrist, the woman he is seeing.
- 3
White Lies
A hedge-fund activist dies under a taxi’s wheels, and the man who pushed him turns out to be a respected drug researcher guarding his CEO’s secret and his daughter’s hope of a cure.
- 4
Two and Twenty
A Wall Street boss is bludgeoned on his way to his helicopter, and the associate who killed him claims his boss’s abuse left him fearing for his life.
- 5
Bend the Knee
A senior partner who led his firm’s resistance to federal pressure is bludgeoned at home, and the colleague charged with his murder claims diplomatic immunity while Washington leans on Baxter to drop the case.
- 6
Brotherly Love
When a restaurateur who employed Riley’s paroled brother is shot dead, the case against the poker-game boss he owed hinges on Matt Riley’s word, until someone tries to stop him from testifying.
- 7
Guardian
A 15-year-old basketball prodigy is beaten to death in his old neighborhood, and the adoptive father who managed his deals claims the boy attacked him first.
- 8
Parasite
A 74-year-old toy magnate is bludgeoned in his hotel suite the night before his wedding, and his 22-year-old bride goes on trial as the prosecution leans on her sexual past.
- 9
Snowflakes (Part 1)
The killing of a Ukrainian woman beside Lt. Brady leads her and SVU’s Capt. Benson to a ring that traffics women from Ukraine to carry babies for sale, and on to a far more dangerous buyer.
- 11
The Enemy of All Women
An engineer at a surveillance-tech firm is shot dead days before she planned to report a rape, and the case against her billionaire boss turns on a friend who has her own secret.
- 12
Never Say Goodbye
A federal aviation investigator is shot dead on his first night of retirement, and the case leads to the widow of a pilot he blamed for a fatal crash, who spends her days talking to an AI avatar of her husband.
- 13
New Normal
A private-school student is gunned down in Washington Heights in place of a gang member trying to quit, and the only witness who can convict the shooter is an undercover officer who refuses to give up his cover.
- 14
Remedies
A wellness influencer is executed on her way home from her book launch, and the shooter, a mother whose daughter gave up cancer treatment on the influencer’s advice, claims she killed to save her child.
- 15
Bright Lights
A celebrated fashion designer is shot dead days after discovering her husband has been living off her money under an invented name, and Price uses a heavy-handed threat to force a reluctant actress to place the gun in his hand.
- 16
Fate’s Cruel Joke
A former gymnastics prodigy is found months dead in a suitcase in a nearly empty luxury building, and the hunt for her influencer boyfriend leaves Riley’s car striking a utility worker, putting his sobriety in doubt.
- 17
Beyond Measure
Two men disguised as museum guards steal a 16th-century crown on loan from the Vatican and kill the guard who tries to stop them, and the archbishop presses Baxter to put the relic’s return ahead of a murder conviction.
- 18
Ride or Die
A young TV reporter is stabbed to death after judging a beauty pageant, and a veteran anchor who blames her for losing her job claims extreme emotional disturbance, defended by the lawyer who once mentored Maroun.
- 19
Accidentally Like a Martyr
A woman from a social media–famous family is strangled after her 30th birthday party, and when her stalker’s confession is suppressed, the defense points to her abusive ex-boyfriend, with her own father testifying for them.
- 20
Once Burned
A celebrated fire captain is beaten to death in his firehouse, and the firefighter with a criminal record who reported finding him claims he killed the captain in self-defense after refusing to cover for a theft.
- 21
Liberty
A vice admiral in New York for Fleet Week is pushed from an elevated walkway, the trail leads to a bribery scheme and the admiral nominated for Secretary of Defense, and Price comes to believe the trial judge is protecting him.