Double Down (Season 7, Episode 19)
Premise: An armed robber caught after a liquor store shooting that killed an off-duty cop offers to reveal where a kidnapped car-service driver is held, if the DA’s office signs his plea deal.
- Air date
- Season/Episode
- Season 7, Episode 19
- Detectives
- Det. Lennie Briscoe (Jerry Orbach), Det. Rey Curtis (Benjamin Bratt)
- ADAs/DA
- Exec. ADA Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston), ADA Jamie Ross (Carey Lowell), DA Adam Schiff (Steven Hill)
- Guest stars
- Luke Reilly as Henry H. Harp, Theresa Merritt as Ruth Titus, Jay Spadaro as Earl Novak, Shawn Elliott as Judge Dominic Santos, Nancy Addison as Judge Selma Davis, Edie Falco as defense attorney Sally Bell
- Director
- Arthur W. Forney
- Writers
- Story: Richard Sweren; Teleplay: Ed Zuckerman; Story & teleplay: Shimon Wincelberg
Summary
The Investigation
“Double Down” begins with a liquor store robbery in which off-duty Officer Russell Schaeffer is killed trying to stop two masked gunmen. With their getaway car blocked by a delivery truck, they escape in a black car-service sedan. The detectives learn that driver Mitchell Titus never showed up for his regular pickup, and his wife Ruth, who says he has a heart condition, begins pressing Lt. Van Buren for answers.
A bloody shirt left at the Port Authority bus terminal leads Briscoe and Curtis to Henry Harp, a robber with prior convictions, as he tries to leave town. The detectives bluff that the bullet removed from his armpit came from Schaeffer’s gun. Harp’s lawyer, Ms. Bell, offers a written deal: Harp pleads to manslaughter and reveals where Titus is, with a 10-year cap if Titus is found alive and 15 years if he is dead.
Over Briscoe’s objections, McCoy agrees to sign at noon if the police have not found Titus by then. The detectives learn Harp borrowed his girlfriend’s car and find a nine-millimeter pistol at the home of his partner, Earl Novak. With Mrs. Titus on the news and the deadline passed, McCoy signs. Harp sends them to a boarded-up building on Avenue A, where Titus has been dead for at least a day, killed by a blow to the head soon after the carjacking.
The Trial
Schiff wants the agreement thrown out, and McCoy charges Harp with first-degree murder and gives notice that he will seek the death penalty. Bell moves to enforce the contract. McCoy cites In re Schrotenboer, a ruling that an immunity deal won in exchange for returning abducted children could not be enforced. Judge Santos agrees, but says that if the deal goes, so does Harp’s confession, the core of the case.
Just before McCoy must choose, the detectives report that Novak’s body has turned up near the Little League field where Harp’s son plays. McCoy honors the deal, then indicts Harp for Novak’s murder using the confession he kept. Bell argues that the robbery and the killing form a single criminal transaction, and Harp himself testifies that he robbed the store and killed Novak to raise $800 for his girlfriend’s rent. McCoy turns to an exception that allows a later prosecution if he did not know of the murder when he took the plea. He, Briscoe and Curtis testify that the detectives told him only that Novak was dead and where he was found.
Spoiler, the ending: Judge Davis finds the story hard to swallow but accepts the sworn word of two detectives and McCoy, and denies the motion to dismiss, so Harp will be tried for Novak’s murder. McCoy rejects Harp’s offer of a new deal.
Why it stands out
- McCoy relies on In re Schrotenboer, a New York Court of Appeals ruling that an immunity deal extracted in exchange for the return of abducted children was unenforceable, to try to escape his own signed agreement.
- To block a new charge, Harp testifies under oath that he murdered his accomplice, arguing the killing was covered by his robbery plea.
- Briscoe and Curtis must testify about exactly what they told McCoy in court, and Curtis faces a sharp cross-examination over why no one said Novak had been murdered.