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"Florida"
SVU, Episode 8.19
Production number: 08018
First aired: 1 May 2007
  th of 502 produced in SVU  
th of 502 released in SVU
  th of 1271 released in all  
Benson Florida
Written By
Jonathan Greene

Directed By
David Platt

Summary[]

Benson risks her career to protect her newfound half-brother, but an investigation into his past reveals even more family secrets.

Plot[]

Benson is reunited with Agent Porter, who's left the field of tracking domestic terrorists and now hunts fugitive sex offenders. He's tapped her to help him Simon Marsden, who's wanted for rape.

Porter wants to know why Benson is involved with the fugitive Simon because he visited her apartment. Benson then informs him that Simon is her half-brother, to his surprise. She also informs Porter of her conception from a rape and that she only tracked down Simon to get know him after learning of his existence. After Porter asks will she contact him if she finds her brother, she confirms it.

When Simon pulls a runner, Benson is given time off, and decides to use that time to learn about the father she never knew, in hopes of gaining insight into Simon. Her world is shaken when she discovers evidence that her father most likely did not rape her mother, as she's long believed, but that the sex between them was consensual.

Benson returns to her apartment where she is found by Cap. Julia Millfield, who wants answers. Julia apologizes for her treatment, still believing that Benson and Simon are involved romantically before Benson clarifies her relationship to Simon as his sister. After understanding why Benson was defending Simon, she asked Benson to come down to her office to make a statement. However, what she did not know was that Olivia had used a moment where she had stepped out of the room to look through and steal pictures from the case file on Simon.

Much later, Benson tracks down other women that her father had raped and all of them confirmed that he was in fact a rapist meaning Benson was conceived from a rape.

With the photographs and Elliot's help, along with the knowledge of Carrie's death, Olivia was able to figure out that Julia was framing Simon and that Julia had figured out where Simon was hiding.

Upon arrival, Olivia, Elliot, and FBI Agent Dean Porter heard a gunshot inside the house. As Olivia and Dean entered the front, Elliot canvassed the property and called for backup. Inside, Julia had been shot and was being held hostage by Simon. Olivia defused the standoff by getting Julia to admit that she had been framing Simon.

There's no time for mourning dead perceptions. Benson learns Millfield, framed him because she believes he raped her sister years earlier, and since Julia's sister has recently died of a drug overdose, a grief-maddened Julia now intends to use Simon's escape from custody as an excuse to kill him.

Benson and Porter find Simon holding a shot Julia at gunpoint, claiming it was an accident, while Julia claims he did it on purpose.

Stabler speaks with the backup sent, telling them that his partner is handling the situation because the hostage taker is her brother.

In the house, Benson gets Simon to let her talk to Julia and Benson reveals she has put together the truth of Julia's sister, Carrie's supposed rape: Simon claims he merely kissed her and accidentally ripped her dress a little and that's all before she freaked out. Benson reveals Simon is innocent as he claims and there's a reason Carrie reacted like that, she sees it everyday: Carrie was molested and it caused her to freak out when Simon kissed her. Julia is horrified when Benson asks her about this as Carrie once told her their father raped her, but Julia didn't believe it, as Carrie's mind was addled by drugs at that point. Julia was never raped or molested herself, so she was unaware of the truth of what her father did. Benson makes her realize that neither Julia or Simon is responsible for Carrie's decline into drugs and subsequent death, her father is. Julia, weakening from her wound and letting go of her vendetta against Simon, confesses she tried to set Simon up before they arrived and his shooting of her truly was an accident as he claimed. She also confesses to framing him for rape, having convinced the victim to pick Simon out of the line-up as well. Simon gives over his gun and ends the stand-off and Julia is taken away in an ambulance and expected to survive her wound. Porter takes Simon away with him, but in light of Julia's confession, it's merely to go to his office and sort the whole mess out and Simon is not under arrest.

Cast[]

Main cast[]

Recurring cast[]

Guest cast[]

References[]

Quotes[]

Michael Thatcher: Is it just me you got a thing for or is it all men?
Benson: Oh, you're the one with a "thing" problem, Micky…Those two girls said you got soft when you raped them. Is that why you hate all women?
Michael Thatcher: What I hate is a bull dyke who gets a little power and thinks she has to use it.

Simon Marsden: Olivia, please believe me, I didn't rape anybody, I'm not a rapist!
Benson: I don't believe rapists, and I know you are one, Simon.

Ryan O'Halloran: How many times have you found someone's head hair in a victim's underwear?


Background information and notes[]

  • This episode continues the Simon Marsden story line from the episode "Philadelphia".
  • Olivia mentions she knew Dean Porter from when she worked undercover for the FBI. She started that assignment in the episode "Informed" and the audience sees her working with Porter while undercover in the episode "Infiltrated".
  • Olivia mentions she ran a DNA test and that's how she found Simon which happened in the episode "Haystack".
  • Olivia finds out her father's name is Joseph Hollister and how he attacked more women than just her mother.
  • Olivia says her mother worked in the dining hall at Columbia University to pay her way through college. She would later be an English professor at the university.
  • Elliot's father took him to a police camp every summer.
  • Olivia quips that her high school senior portrait showed "feathered hair and acid-wash jeans." As indicated by the high school yearbook being examined in the scene, such portraits are generally headshots and would not show the subject's pants. Also, acid wash jeans were not sold in the U.S, until mid-1987, when Olivia would be 19 years old and in college. If this was not a simple continuity error, then she most likely means stonewash jeans, which debuted in 1982.

Episode scene cards[]

1 2 3 4

Office of Julia Millfield
River Park
Police Department
River Park, New Jersey
Tuesday, April 17

Book 'Em Café
186 Crosby Street
Tuesday, April 17

Marsden Residence
93 Ogden Avenue
Moorepark, New York
Wednesday, April 18

Office of the Coroner
Orange County, New York
Wednesday, April 18

5 6 7

Willet-Marcus Residence
248 Brewster Road
Scarsdale, New York
Thursday, April 19

River Park
Police Department
River Park, New Jersey
Friday, April 20

Hollister Residence
476 Jessup Road
Florida, New York
Friday, April 20

Previous episode:
"Responsible"
"Florida"
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Season 8
Next episode:
"Annihilated"
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