Wager (Season 4, Episode 18)
Premise: A rising baseball star’s father is killed over huge gambling debts, and the bookie charged with the murder may not be the one who struck the fatal blow.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 4, Episode 18
- Detectives
- Det. Lennie Briscoe (Jerry Orbach), Det. Mike Logan (Chris Noth)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Ben Stone (Michael Moriarty), ADA Claire Kincaid (Jill Hennessy), DA Adam Schiff (Steven Hill)
- Guest stars
- Malik Yoba as Pat Williams, Keith Hernandez as Drew Harding, Zakes Mokae as Edgar Barkley, Ray Aranha as Dr. Henry “Papa Doc” Doinel, Steve Harris as Joey “Dogs” Lang, Karen Williams as Lucy Williams
- Director
- Ed Sherin
- Writers
- Story: Michael S. Chernuchin; Teleplay: Kevin Arkadie; Story & teleplay: Harvey Solomon
Summary
The Investigation
“Wager” opens when cable workers find Benny Williams beaten to death in his apartment. His son, Pat Williams, is a young baseball star who hired his long-absent father as his business manager. The detectives learn Benny was a womanizer, but a jealous husband with a motive has an alibi and tells them a bookmaker known as Papa Doc had warned people to leave Benny alone. Papa Doc is Henry Doinel, a chiropractor with 43 bookmaking arrests and no convictions.
Pat insists his father quit gambling and joined a support group, but Benny’s sponsor says he kept betting. An informant says Benny owed Papa Doc about $800,000, mostly on college basketball, and Pat’s agent says Benny was draining his son’s money. Pat then claims the debts are his own, placed through his father, and that Papa Doc’s people have threatened his family. His wife, Lucy, identifies the man who confronted her as Joey Lang, known as Joey Dogs. Facing a murder charge, Lang admits going to Benny’s apartment but says Papa Doc did the killing, and Doinel is arrested.
The Trial
Doinel is charged with second-degree murder, attempted grand larceny and promoting gambling, and Kincaid wins remand without bail. Lang testifies that he roughed Benny up on Doinel’s orders but left him alive with Doinel around 9:30 p.m., and he concedes he never heard Doinel plan or admit a killing. Pat testifies that he lost $800,000 through his father, but on cross-examination he cannot recall a single bet the defense reads from Doinel’s own betting records.
Stone wins a two-day continuance. Teammate Drew Harding says that on the night of the murder Pat made a phone call at a bar around 9:30 and left abruptly. Phone records show calls from the bar to Pat’s wife and to Benny, and Pat’s garage attendant says he got home about two hours later, though Lucy insists they were in bed before 10:00. Over Schiff’s objection, Stone tells Pat’s lawyer that all charges against Papa Doc will be dropped unless Pat tells the truth.
Spoiler, the ending: Fearing for his family, Pat admits the debts were his father’s. He went to Benny’s apartment, found him beaten, and hit him when Benny claimed his son owed him because they were family; Benny struck his head on the desk. His lawyer accepts a plea to second-degree manslaughter with the maximum sentence.
Why it stands out
- Former Major League Baseball player Keith Hernandez guest stars as Pat’s teammate.
- Stone breaks the case by threatening to free the defendant he is prosecuting, gambling that the real killer will talk to keep the bookie in jail.
- The prosecution’s star witness undermines the case on the stand by failing to recall any of the bets he claimed to have made.