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"Impulsive"
SVU, Episode 9.03
Production number: 9001
First aired: 9 October 2007
  {{{nNthProducedInSeries}}}th of 502 produced in SVU  
{{{nNthReleasedInSeries}}}th of 502 released in SVU
  {{{nNthReleasedInAll}}}th of 1271 released in all  
Novak Impulsive
Written By
Jonathan Greene

Directed By
David Platt

Plot[]

School teacher Sarah Trent is accused of raping one of her students, Shane Mills after he's diagnosed with gonorrhea. She goes to get an abortion and they confiscate the baby's remains to prove that she had sex with Shane. When they interview Sarah claims that Shane actually raped her. After further investigating, he confesses to raping his teacher. Shane says he has an addiction and undergoes testing. The detectives discover he has brain disorder making him obsessed with sex (he has been exposed to internet porn, hired prostitutes, photoshopped scantily-clad women, and masturbated with high frequency). The detectives worry about someone else using the same disorder to get out of sex crime convictions.

Sarah visits Shane and after talking to him she insists Shane is given another chance. He is sent to a rehabilitation clinic called the Kastner Center. Novak warns Shane that he will serve seven years in prison if he screws up again, something which Shane takes serious notice.

However, the situation quickly changes gears when Shane himself is assaulted and raped in the clinic. Upon learning this, Novak is angered, and it only intensifies when she witnesses several clinic staff cleaning up the crime scene, prompting her to go after the clinic with a vengeance for covering up a crime. The detectives later found out that, with the exception of the administrator David Feldon, the night supervisor, and a guard named Pete Lincoln, all of the clinic staff are ex-cons. Two other young men were raped as well, witnessed by their inmates.

A rape kit identifies Shane's rapist as Earl Romaine, who has stolen the identity of the real Pete Lincoln, who is actually working as a guard in a rehabilitation center in Florida, where Romaine himself was treated. Romaine took the job to rape as many children as he could. It is revealed that clinic staff knew of Romaine's presence in the clinic, but did nothing to stop him from raping Shane. It is also confirmed that Romaine has raped the two other boys as well.

Tutuola confronts Romaine at his apartment building before Lake arrives to help and reveals they are cops. Realizing they're onto him, Romaine promptly flees the scene and is chased but he is hit in the head with a wooden board by Stabler and detained.

Following Romaine's arrest on charges of statutory rape and identity theft, Novak shuts down the Kastner Center with everything she's gathered on it, prompting the other detained boys to be sent to more competent facilities for juvenile sex offenders. Novak also works out another deal with Shane, that he'll be set on probation while receiving his treatment at another facility, though she warns him that same rules apply of any screw-up that will result a seven-year sentence in prison.

While being held in interrogation for his crimes, Earl Romaine insists he doesn't need a lawyer while saying he has Shane's brain disorder as his own defense for raping his victims.

Cast[]

Main cast[]

Recurring cast[]

Guest cast[]

References[]

Quotes[]

Lake: [to Morales] What'd you get?
Tutuola: Ruben Morales, meet Mr. Manners. Chester Lake, my new partner.

Jimmy Trent: She took a life and you are arresting me. I don't see how this makes sense.
Stabler: Well, I'll clear it up for you. Assaulting a cop is against the law. Abortion isn't.

Novak: Mrs. Trent is not a flight risk. The people request $50,000 bail.
Russell Hunter: We object, Your Honor and ask that the warrant for the products of my client's conception be suppressed.
Judge Walter Bradley: I signed that warrant myself, Mr. Hunter. On what grounds?
Russell Hunter: That the seizure of the fetus violates her first amendment right to freedom of religion.
Judge Bradley: And, you, sir are violating the limits of my patience. [to Russell Hunter] This is not a Chinese restaurant, young man. You don't pick from column B, if your column a defense doesn't hold up.

Stabler: You shouldn't play with hookers, Shane. That's how you get the burn.

Bibi: I gave the kid the clap, but I told him to get himself checked.
Novak: Well, aren't you the poster girl for public health?
Stabler: There's more. Just wait. Liv, listen to this. Go on.
Bibi: Last time I screwed Shane, he was bragging that he did his teacher, ripping her clothes off. Just how he practiced with me.
Novak: Practice makes perfect.

Sophie Devere: Your Honor, the filth that the police found on the defendant's computer would make Larry Flynt blush. This kid spends most of his free time looking at porn on the Internet.
Novak: Every adolescent boy in America looks at Internet porn.
Sophie Devere: But I would venture that most of them haven't slept with a couple of dozen hookers.

Novak: How many times did Sarah Trent beg you to stop when you were raping her?
Shane Mills: I don't know. I didn't count.
Novak: Oh, no, you were too busy.

[after Novak and Devere learn that Shane was assaulted]
Devere: I want whoever did this to burn.
Novak: Are you sure? Because I wouldn't want to punish someone who's not responsible for his actions.
Devere: Don't you dare put this mess off on me.
Novak: I put Shane in this mess because I bought into your sideshow in court.
Devere: I gave Shane my best defense. I did my job. Do yours.

Novak: [grabbing Feldron by his shirt] That is right because he and the rest of them are nothing but human garbage
David Feldron: Get away from me!
Novak: I'm gonna find whoever's been brutalizing these kids and I'm gonna prove you've been protecting them to save your own ass you son of a bitch!

Olivia Benson: Casey, you're drowning right now and, unless Stabler can convince that guy to change his mind, I can't even throw you a life jacket.
Casey Novak: I'm a big girl. I know how to swim.

Novak: I convict kids like Shane all the time and I have no idea what happens to them afterwards. I should have checked before I put Shane into that hellhole.
Stabler: That's not your job.
Novak: Whose is it? Is it yours? Court's? Legislature?
Stabler: The best way you can protect these kids is by nailing the son of a bitch who did this to Shane.
Novak: I'm not gonna be much use to you after I take that collar for assaulting Feldron.
Stabler: Well, when I told him what a world of hurt that I would bring on him, he backed off.
Novak: Thanks.

Stabler: Earl Romaine, you're under arrest for the rape of Shane Mills.
Earl Romaine: Screw you.
Lake: Sorry, you're not his type.

Earl Romaine: I can't help myself... Y'know, kinda like that kid I raped.


Background information and notes[]

  • The book that Sarah Trent's class is discussing in the open is The Catcher in the Rye.
  • In the previous two episodes and the following episodes, Olivia's hair is short, but in this episode it's long like at the beginning of season eight, meaning this episode was most likely filmed straight after season eight finished production.
  • In Earl Romaine's mugshot, the Florida city of Ocala is misspelled as O'Cala.

Episode scene cards[]

1 2 3

Apartment of
Sarah Trent
586 183rd Street
Tuesday, August 28

Arraignment
Part 38
Tuesday, August 28

Chambers of
Judge Petrovsky
Friday, August 31

4 5 6

Kastner Center
For Juvenile Offenders
176 Remsen Street
Brooklyn, New York
Tuesday, October 2

Mercy General Hospital
365 West 32nd Street
Tuesday, October 2

Apartment of
Earl Romaine
51 Dobbin Street
Brooklyn, New York
Tuesday, October 2

Previous episode:
"Avatar"
"Impulsive"
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Season 9
Next episode:
"Savant"
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