Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (TV Series)

Control (2003)

Diane Neal: ADA Casey Novak

Quotes 

• Detective Olivia Benson : I can't believe that Granger's making me a suspect.

  Casey Novak : You went to the hotel alone. You were found with the body. He's trying to create reasonable doubt.

  Detective Olivia Benson : So what the hell do I do?

  Casey Novak : Fall on your sword.

  Detective Olivia Benson : Meaning what?

  Casey Novak : You'll admit that you screwed up four years ago and that you went to the hotel room alone. Then you'll deny you murdered Gorman.

  Detective Olivia Benson : Casey, I...

  Casey Novak : I gotta talk to my boss. See if I can fix this mess.

  [leaves the room] 

  Detective Olivia Benson : She didn't even ask me if I did it.

  Detective Elliot Stabler : She can't. Look, if she did, and you admitted killing Gorman, she couldn't put you on the stand without suborning perjury.

  Detective Olivia Benson : You didn't ask me either.

  Detective Elliot Stabler : I know you didn't. You'd have shot the bastard.

• Casey Novak : [during her opening statement]  Horace Gorman was an evil man who committed unspeakable acts of violence, depravity, and cruelty. Nothing would have pleased me more than to convict him and send him to jail for the rest of his life, but I can't. I can't because this woman took the law into her own hands and executed Horace Gorman. Now some of you may be thinking, "Hey, good for her" or you'd do the same to anyone who hurt your child. We all understand the impulse to take revenge, but that doesn't mean we should do it. No one is above the law. Murder is murder, no matter who commits it or why.

• Lionel Granger : [during his opening statement]  Ms. Novak's arguments make sense to me, and I hope to you. Murder is murder, no matter who commits it, but, ladies and gentlemen, we don't know who killed Mr. Gorman. Sure, the DA indicted my client, but an indictment isn't evidence. Juliet Barclay may have had a motive to kill Horace Gorman, but motive isn't evidence. And if it was, Juliet Barclay is only one of any number of women with the same motive. There's one woman with more than just a motive to kill Horace Gorman. She also had the means and the opportunity. A woman who knew exactly where Horace Gorman was hiding and went there alone to take her revenge. A woman with a desperate desire to see Mr. Gorman pay for his sins and atone for her own. That woman is Detective Olivia Benson.

  Casey Novak : Objection, Your Honor!

• Detective Olivia Benson : [to Hillary]  Venti whole milk latte. That's what you ordered at the coffee shop when your mother murdered Gorman. We saw you on their surveillance tape.

  Hilary Barclay : Are you going to arrest her?

  Detective Olivia Benson : We can't. Double jeopardy.

  Hilary Barclay : I don't mind going to jail.

  Detective Olivia Benson : Because you castrated him?

  Hilary Barclay : I followed him for days, waiting for the right moment to kill him. He saw me on the subway platform. I said, "I know who you are," and that I was going to tell his dirty secret. He laughed and said, "Go ahead. No one's going to believe a whoring junkie." He turned, and I hit him on the back of the head, and I dragged him to the end of the platform. And he was lying there, and I had the perfect chance to kill him, but then I realized that castrating him would make him suffer even more.

  Detective Olivia Benson : And you told your mother what you'd done? When did you find out that your mother murdered him?

  Hilary Barclay : Not until after you came to arrest me. She did it for me. She wanted to keep me safe. I couldn't let her go to jail.

  Casey Novak : She belongs there. Now, what happened to you is horrible, and I am sorry, but nothing gives you the right to lie, or your mother the right to murder.

  Hilary Barclay : Well, he'll never torture another woman again, will he?

• Lionel Granger : [to Novak]  Ready to talk plea?

  Casey Novak : Not on your life.

  Lionel Granger : You don't have anything.

  Casey Novak : I have the spontaneous admission in the apartment. Juliet said, and I quote, "I did it." What more do I need?