Homesick (Season 6, Episode 22)
Premise: A five-month-old dies of nicotine poisoning after a jar of strained plums, and suspicion falls on his unhappy English au pair.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 6, Episode 22
- Detectives
- Det. Lennie Briscoe (Jerry Orbach), Det. Rey Curtis (Benjamin Bratt)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston), ADA Claire Kincaid (Jill Hennessy), DA Adam Schiff (Steven Hill)
- Guest stars
- Annika Peterson as Lila Crenshaw, Patti LuPone as defense attorney Ruth Miller, Kim Raver as Wendy Karmel, Charlie Hofheimer as Ben Karmel, Carolyn McCormick as Dr. Elizabeth Olivet
- Ripped from the headlines
- Based on the Kristie Fischer case.
- Director
- Matthew Penn
- Writers
- Story: Michael S. Chernuchin; Teleplay: Elaine Loeser; Story & teleplay: Barry M. Schkolnick
Summary
The Investigation
“Homesick” begins when Warren Karmel returns from Boston and finds his five-month-old son, Evan, barely breathing in his crib. The baby dies at the hospital, and the medical examiner finds plums and nicotine in his stomach. The au pair, Lila Crenshaw, says she fed him the rest of a jar his mother opened that morning.
Another neighborhood baby who ate the same brand died a month earlier, so the detectives look at the maker and an upscale grocery that delivers to both homes. A fired delivery boy says the Karmels fought over Wendy Karmel’s long hours. Warren’s teenage son, Ben, points to Lila, who once gave Evan brandy for teething.
Lila admits hearing Evan cry and vomit over the monitor without checking on him. Her agency keeps her plane ticket until she serves a year, a former employer says a doctor found her depressed, and an ex-boyfriend says she longed to go home. The jar holds a rose pesticide whose active ingredient is nicotine, and a search of her room, allowed by the Karmels, finds the pesticide, a receipt from the day before Evan died and a diary of complaints about him. She is charged with murder.
The Trial
Judge Beth Krieger treats the bedroom as Lila’s private space and suppresses everything found there. Defense attorney Ruth Miller mocks Dr. Olivet for leaning on a 1907 German study of homesick nursemaids and grills Wendy about her travel. The jury splits seven to five for acquittal, and Krieger declares a mistrial.
For the retrial, McCoy drops motive and argues depraved indifference: Lila had a duty to Evan and ignored his distress. While Kincaid preps Ben, he adds that he saw the pesticide in Lila’s room, but it was bought after the last visit he described. At Schiff’s urging, McCoy leaves the gap for Miller, whose cross shows Ben skipped school and was not at the Mets opener he claims to have attended.
Spoiler, the ending: In chambers Ben admits he poisoned his half-brother because his father forgot their yearly trip to the opening game, and he is taken into custody instead of Lila.
Why it stands out
- Patti LuPone guest stars as Ruth Miller, who wins a hung jury by putting the mother’s career on trial.
- Judge Krieger’s ruling that a live-in employee’s bedroom is off-limits to a search approved only by her employer strips the prosecution of its physical evidence.
- With jeopardy already attached, McCoy lets the defense expose his own witness rather than drop the case against Lila.