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"Zebras"
SVU, Episode 10.22
Production number:
First aired: 2 June 2009
  th of 502 produced in SVU  
th of 502 released in SVU
  th of 1271 released in all  
SVU Detectives and CSU Stuckey Zebra
Written By
Amanda Green & Daniel Truly

Directed By
Peter Leto

Summary[]

Episode summary

Plot[]

A father and daughter rollerblading in Central Park stumble across the body of a woman with several lacerations hidden in a bush. Munch and Tutuola learn Peter Harrison, who was performing community service for a prior crime against a woman, left work early with a cut thumb around the time of the murder. Stabler and Benson question Harrison, who spouts wild conspiracy theories about the police. During an interrogation, Harrison suggests he killed the woman in Central Park because she was taking photos of him, before the questioning is stopped by his attorney, Julia Zimmer. Munch and Fin find a bloody knife during a search of Harrison's apartment and forensics technician Ryan O'Halloran finds the DNA matches the victim, resulting in an open-and-shut case against Harrison. However, Zimmer finds a technical error by forensics technician Dale Stuckey in the evidence paperwork. Stuckey insists he made no mistake, but Judge Elizabeth Donnelly is forced to set Harrison free, with a harsh rebuke against Stuckey.

Shortly afterward, another woman is found murdered at Coney Island in exactly the same way, and during the investigation Stuckey finds a soda can with Harrison's bloody thumbprint on it. The police learn Harrison told his hiding place to a friend on a conspiracy theorist website Harrison set a gas trap that nearly killed Detectives Stabler and Tutuola. Ryan O'Halloran told them they are lucky to be alive; Munch recognizes the friend as his ex-wife Gwen Munch, whom he convinces to reveal Harrison's location, but he eludes capture. Stabler and Benson ask for help from Zimmer, who said she has been taking care of Harrison since he lost his parents as a child. An unstable Harrison visits Zimmer, who calls Stabler and Benson to arrest him. As they are about to return to the precinct, Zimmer gets locked into her car and a poisonous gas is released into the air; Stabler breaks her car window but she has already been killed, presumably by Harrison.

Later, Judge Donnelly is nearly killed when she sits on a needle filled with Potassium chloride at her home; she is saved when Stabler and Benson rush her to the hospital. O'Halloran tells Stabler and Benson that a mosquito sucked the blood from the killer as he or she was rigging Zimmer's car, and that the DNA from the blood will likely implicate Harrison. As the DNA is later being processed, however, O'Halloran is stabbed and killed by someone in the forensics lab. Stabler arrives and sees on the computer screen that the DNA matches Stuckey. He is knocked out from behind by Stuckey. Stabler's phone then rings with a call from Benson and Stuckey answers, saying Stabler went out for sushi and left his phone. He then ties Stabler to a chair and starts torturing him. Stuckey admits he killed the woman at Coney Island in order to frame Harrison, and that he attacked Zimmer and Donnelly for embarrassing him. Benson arrives and is held at gunpoint by Stuckey, but she convinces Stuckey that she too hates Stabler and is in love with Stuckey. While Benson kisses Stuckey to distract him, Stabler kicks him from behind, allowing Benson to knock Stuckey out and free Stabler. He asks Benson how she knew he was in trouble and Benson tells him that Stuckey told her he went out for sushi, something she knows he doesn't like since it has raw fish.

Cast[]

Main cast[]

Recurring cast[]

Guest cast[]

References[]

  • Coney Island
  • Gotham School of Fine Arts
  • Annie May Lawson
  • Mercy General Hospital
  • Rachel Nauss
  • Overthrow Bookstore
  • Persecute-U

Quotes[]

O'Halloran: Warner tested the DNA. It's the victim's blood all right.
Stabler: Bing, bang...
O'Halloran: Don't say it, please.

[Stuckey has screwed up the intake on the murder weapon, rendering it inadmissible in court]
Stabler: I'm gonna kill him.
O'Halloran: I'll dump the body.

Peter Harrison: Judge, you're a lone beacon of hope in the struggle against global mind control.
Judge Donnelly: Save it. You're a murderer walking on a technicality. If it were up to me, you'd be in the nuthouse where you belong.
Dale Stuckey: You're the nut for letting him go.
Judge Donnelly: Is everybody crazy today? Five minute recess. [bangs gavel] People! Take your meds.

[Fin makes a remark about Munch and Gwen, a crazy woman he went to for help]
Munch: She's my ex-wife.

[Stuckey's incompetence has gotten the charges against Peter Harrison dismissed]
Stuckey: I'm good at my job, okay?
Judge Donnelly: Mr. Stuckey, you are out of order and seriously deluded. If this is your idea of a good job, then you are in the wrong line of work.
Stuckey: You don't know me, I-
Judge Donnelly: I don't care to. Sit down and shut up.

[Upon viewing Peter Harrison's artwork]
Edgar Radzinski: Even in madness, the creative impulse remains.

Stuckey: Captain, he just assaulted me. You have to write him up.
Cragen: The only one getting a rip around here is you, Dale.
Stuckey: He just accosted me.
Cragen: If Elliot puts your head through a wall, I'm going to have to do a lot of tiresome paperwork. Get out of my squad.

[A gas bomb has gone off in Zimmer's car, killing her]
Peter Harrison: I tried to warn her--the tentacles are everywhere! DEATH TO ALL BETRAYERS! ALL OF THEM!

[Stabler hands off a mentally unstable suspect to a uniformed officer]
Stabler: Take Zombie Boy to the prison word at Bellevue. Do not pass go. Don't collect $200.

Munch: Gwen, you know me. I'm your friend.
Munch: John, friends do not lie to each other... or drag people off the streets and lock them up!

[Munch's ex wife has just thrown water at him as Fin walks by]
Tutuola: Clean up on aisle three.

Stabler: YOU tried to kill Donnelly... and gassed Zimmerman's car.
Stuckey: I killed O'Halloran too. And now... you.

Dale Stuckey: I have been a busy little zebra, haven't I?

Benson: "Liv, do this!" [slaps Stabler] "Liv, do that!" [slaps him again] I'm sick of it!
Stuckey: [gleefully] Hit him again!
Stabler: Don't do it, bitch.
Benson: NO MORE ORDERS FROM YOU!

Background information and notes[]

  • This is the 10th season finale.
  • This marks the last time Forensics Technician Ryan O'Halloran, Defense Attorney Julia Zimmer, and Forensics Technician Dale Stuckey appear in any installments.
  • The fate of Judge Donnelly would not be known until next season, though after the detectives rush her to the hospital, the doctor tells Benson that she is going to be fine. Donnelly became the trial judge in next season's episode Confidential.
  • This was the only season finale of SVU to air in June until Season 22.
  • Richard Belzer, the actor who portrays John Munch, in real life has been married and divorced several times and is a staunch conspiracy theorist, along with being a published author of his theories.
  • At one point, Benson quotes to Stuckey "When you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras". This is a famous medical aphorism credited to Dr. Theodore Woodward, from which the episode gets its name; "zebra" is medical slang for arriving at an exotic or extravagant diagnosis, when a more commonplace explanation is more likely.

Episode scene cards[]

1 2 3

Residence of
Peter Harrison
778 Amsterdam Avenue
Monday, May 25

Arraignment Court
Part 29
Tuesday, May 26

Coney Island
Tuesday, May 26

4 5 6

Overthrow Bookstore
37 Ludlow Street
Tuesday, May 26

2378 Broadway
Tuesday, May 26

Mercy General Hospital
365 West 32nd Street
Wednesday, May 27

Previous episode:
"Liberties"
"Zebras"
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Season 10
Next episode:
"Unstable"
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