The Ledger

11.2 Turnstile Justice

In this episode (11.2), a woman is found dead, lying on a bench on a subway platform. She's been bludgeoned to death. Briscoe and Green's investigation leads to an emotionally disturbed person, but McCoy isn't content to prosecute just him: he goes after the health management organization that released him without medication from Rikers the day before the murder, even though they knew he was crazy and violent.

The episode begins with a woman seeking help from some transit cops in a subway station: she says that a homeless woman is lying on a bench and being eyed by some ruffians. The cops respond, and soon determine the woman is dead. Briscoe and Green arrive to investigate, and learn that the woman has been hit over the head, and has been dead less than two hours. Back at the precinct, they read a report that indicates the murder weapon was a paving stone, present at the crime scene because the area was under construction. They canvas the neighborhood around the station, looking for anyone who can identify the victim based on their photo of her corpse. Their search takes them from the station, to a newspaper stand, to a coffee shop, to a photo processing shop. At the photo shop, they flip through some pictures that haven't been picked up. They belong to a woman named Donatelli, and show her with her kids. They check for Donatelli's in the phone book, and eventually land at the home of a man who says he is her ex-husband. He is extremely distraught to learn of her death. (This becomes important later on.) He says she determined a few years ago that she was gay, and so even though they loved each other, they had to stop living as husband and wife.

At the precinct, Van Buren says the case reminds her of "that Konshalovsky woman" (sp?) from last year. (Apparently, someone else was hit with a brick.) They get a call that Mrs Donnatelli's AmEx card has been used. They review a security tape at the store, so they know what the purchasers -- a couple of teenage girls look like. They get another call: it's been used at a movie theater. They go to the movie theater, and take the two girls in for questioning. One of them rolls on the person who gave them the credit card, the other girl's boyfriend, Trey. They visit Trey at his place of work, and Green intimidates him until he says he bought the card from a "street dude" named Raffi. They track Raffi down at a shelter, and he says he saw the murder take place. He says he saw a guy beat the woman with a rock, and he (Raffi) just stripped the body of its valuables. He says Raffi took the victim's glasses. He describes Raffi as "buggy." They track down reports of EDPs (emotionally disturbed persons) in the area from around the time of the murder, and talk to a couple of beat cops who ran into Raffi pre-murder, but didn't book him. One of the cops says he dropped him off at an SRO (an SRO is like a very crappy, cheap hotel where people live when they don't have a lot of money). They go to the SRO, and find Raffi's room. They enter, and Raffi is ruffling through a pile of papers, and is quite obviously emotionally disturbed. Green makes nice with him, and they take him into custody.

Carmichael comes down to the precinct because Raffi refuses to be fingerprinted. He spazzes on her when she tries to talk to him, and then she calms him down. He wants to go outside. He says he took the victim's glasses because "I couldn't see who was talking to me." You get the impression he means the voices in his head. When AC asks him his name, he pauses and says, "Regis Philbin," prompting Briscoe to ask, "Is that your final answer?" Carmichael says, fine, if you let us fingerprint you, then everybody will know it's true. He apparently agrees, and through the fingerprints they learn his real name is Brian Gallant. Off camera, he confesses to the attack, and to the attack on Konshalavsky, too. The ADAs meet with his defense attorney, and McCoy reluctantly agrees that he can plead to Man I, and they can make proper arrangements for his care.

At his plea hearing, Gallant is under medication, and appears sleepy and dazed. His eyes are three-quarters closed as the judge asks him whether he killed the two women (he says yes) and if he understands the plea deal, which will end in his incarceration for 10-20 years. He says yes, and the judge says that concludes the preceedings. Well, that emotional ex-husband of the victim doesn't like the sound of that: he stands up and tells the judge other people are responsible for the murder of his ex-wife, such as whoever put Gallant back out on the street even though he was crazy. The judge tells him this is neither the time nor the place, and he emotionally replies that if they tell him the time and the place, he will be there. Although I think he over-acted slightly in his first scene, in this one, the actor playing the husband does a good job, and it sort of pays off his emotion from the earlier scene.

The DAs meet, and describe how Gallant was released from Rikers and dropped at a subway station in Queens with a token and a $1.25 and no medication and left to fend for himself. They try to determine whether anyone else shares criminal liability for the death of Donnatelli. They review medical records from Rikers and see that the number of hospital referrals began dropping drastically six months ago -- when a private HMO took over management of the prison's health care system.

They visit the offices of the HMO, SMJ Medical, and talk to the chief executive, who is represented by recurring character Mr Axtel(l). They confirm that Gallant was released with no meds. AC talks to Gallant's medical case officer at the prison, who has a new job now. AC wants to know who authorized Gallant's release. The ADAs talk to a doctor at Rikers, who says he worked with Gallant when he visited Rikers, and says he was threatened by the CEO not to refer patients to the hospital. He says another doctor was fired for continuing to issue referrals.

They arrest the CEO in a meeting (41') and his trial starts immediately. The doctor testifies, as does Gallant, who talks about how his "bad uncle" tells him to do things when he's on drugs, but the bad uncle "stays in Yonkers" when he takes his meds. The CEO testifies and accidentally admits that he occasionally reviewed Gallant's medical records. McCoy takes advantage of this admission, since it shows that the CEO had awareness of the consequences of not having him go to a hospital or be on meds. After some closing statements, the verdict comes back: not guilty on Manslaughter 2, but guilty of criminally negligent homicide. Way to go, McCoy!

In the epilogue, McCoy rather cheesily states that Dateline called and they want to interview her. When AC cheesily asks who's going to interview her, Jane Pauley or Stone Phillips, she says -- in school girl crush sort of way -- Stone Phillips. WHO WRITES THIS CRAP??

Casting note: one of the jurors is played by Lance Reddick [pic], who appears in two other episodes, but with speaking parts: once as a Sierre Leonean soldier, and once as an FBI agent. The actor playing the victim's husband does a decent job, but the best performance in the ep is from Ray Anthony Thomas as the emotionally disturbed Brian Gallant. He appears in a bunch of other L&O eps, but is hardly recognizable here.

The episode's title refers to the term for a justice system that values expediency more than true justice, and also refers to the (approximate) scene of the crime.

Posted by adm at June 21, 2004 04:21 AM

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