7 Talk

Jack McCoy

Jack McCoy

Jack McCoy.
Title District Attorney

Affiliation Manhattan District Attorney's Office


Occupation Lawyer
Current status Alive
First Appearance L&O: "Second Opinion"


Played by Sam Waterston

Jack McCoy is currently the District Attorney for the borough of Manhattan. McCoy was previously an Executive Assistant District Attorney.

1 Biography
2 Appearances
3 Trivia

BiographyEdit

Early lifeEdit

Jack's father, a first- or second-generation Irish immigrant, was a police officer for 31 years. However, the elder McCoy was also abusive, beating both Jack and his mother, secure in the knowledge that his badge would protect him from the consequences.

In his teenage years, Jack rebelled, protesting against Vietnam and Nixon's policies, but did not find much satisfaction in being on the losing side. And then, sometime around 1966, Jack discovered the law.

College lifeEdit

To this end, Jack became a lawyer, apparently graduating from New York University in 1970. In 1972, he published a piece in the New York University Law Review defending Catholic priests who refused to be enlisted due to religious objections to the Vietnam War. During that time, he worked for the Manhattan District Attorney's Office.

Lawyer lifeEdit

In 1994, Executive ADA Benjamin Stone resigned from his post in the wake of a case in which the main witness had been murdered by the Russian Mafia, and DA Adam Schiff appointed McCoy as Stone's successor. When Arthur Branch resigned as the District Attorney, McCoy was appointed to succeed Branch as the District Attorney for the Borough of Manhattan. McCoy appointed ADA Michael Cutter as his successor in the position of EADA.

AppearancesEdit

- Law & Order (First appearance, 14 seasons, 340 episodes) - Sam Waterston
- Homicide: Life on the Street (2 seasons, 2 episodes) - Sam Waterston
  - Season 6, 1 episode
  - Season 7, 1 episode
- Exiled: A Law & Order Movie - Sam Waterston
- Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (3 seasons, 3 episodes) - Sam Waterston
  - Season 1, 1 episode
  - Season 9, 1 episode
  - Season 11.21
- Law & Order: Trial by Jury (1 season, 2 episodes) - Sam Waterston
  - Season 1, 2 episodes

TriviaEdit

McCoy currently holds the record for most police officers prosecuted under his tenure. ^{[citation needed]}
Jack was married at one point to a woman named Ellen. They had at least one daughter together, but ended up getting a divorce. That daughter was seen in the Season 17 episode "Fallout", and in 2009, McCoy mentioned that she was pregnant. ("Dignity") McCoy has been divorced at least twice however, as he remarked in Home Sweet that Alissa Goodwyn was his second ex-wife's divorce attorney.