.
- In the criminal justice system,
sexually based offenses
are considered especially heinous.
In New York City, the dedicated detectives
who investigate these vicious felonies
are members of an elite squad
known as the Special Victims Unit.
These are their stories.
[indistinct chatter]
- [sighs] - Mm.
Oh, hey, Zoe, check out those two guys.
Mr. Wellness and his sidekick.
- The King of Kale. - Mm-hmm.
Yeah, underneath their hemp shirts lurk the abs
of two very well-practiced yoginis.
- Mm, I don't want my pillows
to smell like patchouli tomorrow.
-Okay.
Okay, uh...
ooh, how about Baron Von Broker sitting by himself?
- Jenna, he has a ring on his finger.
- Don't sabotage yourself with morality, Zoe.
I'm trying to get you laid. - What?
What if somebody tried to pick up your husband?
- Oh, I'd be flattered for Richard.
Ever since the kid was born, his testosterone
has dropped like the Dow.
- Maybe I just start seeing my shrink again.
- No, she has had two years to fix you.
You are my project now.
Oh, what about him?
- The sad dad? - Yeah.
- No. He's probably divorced.
No ring. - He's normal.
The male equivalent of a Nissan Altima.
Just your type.
- I hate this.
This isn't what I want.
- Look, I get it.
You miss Brian.
- I loved him.
- We all loved him.
Okay?
Okay, look, listen.
Soho on a Thursday night is like the ocean.
What you need is an aquarium.
- A dating app? - Yeah.
- Oh, I don't know. I haven't done that before.
- Neither have I. - You are married.
- Yeah, but I would walk through the valley
of the shadow of Seth with you.
Well, this guy owns his own helicopter.
- Really? Jeez.
- Oh, isn't this that chef from that cooking show you watch?
You should reply. - On your profile?
I'm pretty sure that's not how this works.
- It's time you were touched by something
that doesn't require batteries.
- Jenna, he matched with you,
a blonde with nonexistent pores.
What do you think's gonna happen when I show up?
- What I need is more wine.
- No.
I'm tired.
I just wanna go to bed.
This all just reminds me of college,
always buying three tickets to every movie, one for you,
one for Richard--
- And poor Zoe.
- Mm-hmm.
- It just takes time.
- I already had mine with Brian.
Maybe that's all the happiness I deserve.
[pensive music]
♪
[phone chimes]
- He's cute. You matched?
- He's smart, well read.
- Klaus Darcy, educated in Sweden.
- I can almost hear his accent through the texts.
- Oh, Zoe, all these DMs already?
- What?
We've been texting a whole week.
- Girl, you're being love bombed.
- Better than being bombed,
like when I was living at your place.
You should calm down with the Sancerre.
- "Klaus: where are you right now?
"You: doing laundry.
Klaus: stop what you're doing and touch yourself"?
Zoe! - What?
Brian and I used to get a little freaky
from time to time. It's nobody's business.
- Everything is my business.
- Are you telling me you and Richard
never get a little freaky?
- Okay, you stayed at our place for a year
after Brian passed.
How many times did you hear the bed creak?
What if he's married?
- I'm okay with that.
- You're not actually planning on meeting this guy, are you?
- If I can goad him into it.
Can't you just be happy for me?
- I am. I am.
I'm just--I'm a little--
- Jealous?
[laughs]
- Mind if I read one more?
"The satisfaction for me comes from knowing
you do exactly what I ask."
[phone chimes]
- [scoffs]
Lucky for you, I like having my boundaries pushed.
[soft anticipatory music]
♪
Done.
Yes.
Yes, sir.
♪
[dramatic music]
♪
- Captain. Captain. - Yeah?
- Velasco's motorcycle wasn't downstairs
for the third day in a row.
- That's good detective work, Muncy,
but I told you that I gave him a couple of days off.
- Well, can I call him? - No.
- Just to check in? - No.
- Come on. How is that fair?
- Muncy, most of life is not fair.
Velasco is still above ground,
unlike the father and son whose murders he witnessed.
Now, I know that Velasco wasn't a cop at the time,
but he is now.
So it falls on him to bring his friend to justice.
- Captain.
Sorry for the intrusion.
- Oh, you don't have to stand.
No need for fanfare.
- I got a message last night?
Said I'm temporarily transferred
to Manhattan Special Victims.
Authority, Chief McGrath? - And?
- I didn't even think he knew who I was.
- Well, he does now.
How do you feel about that?
- [chuckles]
One thing that inspires me,
that has driven me all my life, is excellence.
- This isn't the Bronx, you are aware?
- Your metrics speak for themself.
Only squad with a 90% closure rate.
But why not aim for 100?
Am I right?
- I will take that as a yes.
- She didn't shake my hand when I first started.
- No offense, but you were brought here by way of Duarte.
Lucky she didn't throw up a gang sign.
[phone buzzes]
- Sarge, what do I do?
I'm not supposed to answer.
- Muncy, work is about overcoming problems,
problems you wouldn't have if you were unemployed.
So how about we do our jobs before we lose them.
- Hey, Sarge.
- Hi. I'm Detective Muncy.
This is Sergeant Tutuola.
- Can we help you?
- I have her clothes here, the lingerie, too,
everything she wore last night.
- I think I was raped.
[suspenseful music]
- Klaus Darcy?
- I met him online.
Started DMing me a month ago.
He was handsome.
To be honest, I was pretty shocked
he even swiped right on me.
- Why is that?
- Jenna usually gets all the attention.
- Okay, why don't you tell us what happened?
- Our chat became kinky.
- Kinky how?
- There's nothing we haven't heard.
- We did BDSM stuff.
- Any of it ever cross a line?
- Not at first.
It started with him giving me little fun orders over text,
uh, making me call him sir.
He sent me a belly chain to wear under my clothes.
We had an agreement that when I had it on, he owned me.
- Where would you meet?
- We only ever met at hotels for safety.
- Okay.
Describe an average encounter.
- He got off on me blindfolding myself
with my dead husband's neckties.
He said grief had robbed me of my whole way of seeing things.
He wanted to explore that with me.
It felt therapeutic.
- Was there penetration?
- I was starting to think he couldn't even get it up,
but he never even tried.
- When did things go wrong?
- Last night.
- Did you say no or stop?
- Some kind of safe word-- - I said both.
But by the time I said it, he already...
came inside of me.
- Then what?
- And then he left.
In a way, I feel bad for him,
all that build-up.
I think he was embarrassed for not lasting longer.
And his size-- he wasn't very big.
- We're gonna need you to get a rape kit.
- And we're gonna need to talk to this Klaus guy.
- We only ever communicated through the app.
- It's okay.
It's a start.
- Zoe came over to my house late last night,
crying, as usual.
And Richard, my husband, just offered up the guest room.
Out of reflex, I guess.
- Is there some kind of past history?
- The past two years have been crazy on all of us.
- Okay, what happened two years ago?
- Zoe lost her husband the same month I gave birth to my son.
- Wow.
- Richard and I had no choice but to take her in.
- Oh.
- In some ways, it was like we suddenly had two newborns.
- What did Zoe say happened last night?
- Some rando she'd been seeing--
she met him on an app about a month ago--
raped her.
I warned her not to get involved with him.
- Why, what did you think was off about it?
- If your best friend of 14 years
was trying to goad some S&M guy to meet her at a hotel,
wouldn't you try to stop her?
- So when did she tell you that she'd been raped?
- A few hours ago, after Richard left for work.
I guess she wanted to keep it secret.
- That's normal.
- [sighs] I feel awful.
You know, I'm the one who pushed her
to get back out on the market.
And it's a sad thought,
but my marriage is pretty boring.
[pensive music]
I think I just wanted to live vicariously through her.
- Well, you know, life is such an odd mix
of beauty and pain, right?
We can't control how that unfolds
for the people that we love, much less ourselves.
- Hmm.
- Take care.
- Thank you.
SANE nurse put a rush on Zoe's kit.
Found signs of bruising, trauma.
- But the hot shower she took must've washed away any DNA.
- What about the clothes that Jenna brought in?
- Lab was able to recover semen from the lingerie.
- That confirms this story. That's good news.
- M.E.'s running it through CODIS.
- All right, and what do we know about Klaus Darcy?
- Hotel room was paid for by Zoe.
- That's a bit odd for some stud, isn't it?
- Well, maybe the wife sees his credit card bills.
- Seems to be a lot of history
between Jenna's husband and Zoe.
Another woman lives in their house for a year,
Richard starts to fantasize.
- So he what?
Raped her to knock it off his bucket list?
- You can't underestimate the power of sexual fantasy.
Sometimes it adds to the initial momentum
of sex crimes.
- Yeah, I got a fantasy.
It involves you going back up to the Bronx.
- Whoa, Muncy. Take it easy.
- You're pissed about your friend.
- Yeah, I am, 'cause you recorded him
without his knowledge.
- I get it. You're loyal to him.
- Wanna give them both a time out?
- No. I have a better idea.
Churlish, go talk to Jenna's husband
and find out if he had an alibi.
- Copy that, Captain.
- Muncy, what about the dating website?
- Burner cell phone, fake email address.
The guy never graduated from the free trial period
of the dating app, so I can't check it with a credit card.
Zoe was his only match.
I did do a reverse image search.
- And?
- And the picture was copied off a website
of some river raft excursion guide in Sweden.
- This perp is trying hard to stay anonymous.
- Yeah, I did call and confirm the Swedish guy's
never even been stateside.
- Look, if he went to all this trouble,
he also must have worked hard to target Zoe.
- Yeah.
- Has--does Zoe have any issues with men?
Relationship problems? Coworkers?
- The way Zoe tells it, no.
- Okay, well, canvass her building,
her neighborhood, coworkers, and scrub her social media.
- On it, Captain.
- Hey, Liv, lab found a DNA match.
- The guy's in the system?
- It's a familial match.
- To who?
- Zoe's dead husband.
[tense music]
.
- My husband was arrested in college.
- So you knew about it?
- He stole a keg from the freezer
of a liquor store he worked in for a party.
- Okay.
- So that's how his DNA is in the police database?
- In 2010, New York started taking
DNA samples for misdemeanors.
- And the DNA on my rape kit is somehow a match to Brian's?
- Well, it's a familial match,
which means it's a male relative.
- You're saying Klaus is related to my dead husband?
That's impossible.
Brian wasn't Swedish.
- Well, the funny thing is,
Klaus isn't even Klaus.
- So Zoe, um,
we need a list of your husband's male relatives.
- I haven't talked to the majority of them
since the funeral.
- Well, I'm sure you remember their names?
- I was only ever close with his nephew, um,
Brian's older sister's kid.
- What's his name?
- Cooper.
- But he's just a kid.
He's 23 years old.
- Cooper. - No.
Absolutely not.
No, I would know if it were him.
- Can you say that with 100% certainty?
I mean, you said that you were blindfolded in the dark,
and Klaus only spoke to you in a whisper.
[suspenseful music]
- Oh, I feel like puking.
- When's the last time you saw Cooper?
- I take him to dinner from time to time...
[stammers] Just to try and stay in touch.
He's a--he's a med school student.
Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
I never should have gone on that website.
I feel like I'm losing control over my life.
I just-- - Okay. All right.
- I just wanted to reclaim myself.
I don't--I don't want his nephew arrested.
- All right, one step at a time.
So first of all,
all we're gonna do is talk to him.
And whatever happens after that,
you will be part of the decision.
- Okay.
- Wait.
Aunt Zoe he was assaulted and told you
I'm the one that did it?
- Well, she didn't say that, but DNA is hard to argue with.
- Where were you two nights ago?
- I was studying. Ask my friends.
- Let me see your phone.
No dating apps.
- I live in a co-ed dorm.
- You might have deleted it.
- Look, my Aunt Zoe and I are really close.
- Yeah, the question is, how close?
- Ew. She's my aunt.
It's only hot in porn.
- Well, you forget one thing.
There's a DNA connection to you.
- So we're gonna need a sample.
- Wait.
I'm guessing it was seminal fluid you found on her?
- That's right.
- I'm a donor.
Past two years, a really popular one.
- Yeah, tall, blue eyes, med student.
I'm sure you do all right.
- Make 1,500 bucks a month.
- Someone hit the genetic lottery.
- It helps me pay my way through school.
- Okay, well, any chance you might know who
had access to your donation?
- It's all confidential. - Okay.
Well, then we're still gonna need that swab, man.
Unfortunately, this one doesn't pay at all.
Open up.
Come on.
- Let me get this straight.
Cooper Davis, the 23-year-old nephew
of the victim's deceased husband,
is a DNA match for her rape kit?
- The short answer is yes.
- The long answer?
- Not much longer. - I'm listening.
- He's a sperm donor.
We checked with the bank.
Profile's been requested a dozen times in the last month.
- But because of HIPAA laws, confidentiality,
they're not gonna give you those names.
- Right, but this is a specific kind of sexual assault.
Can you get a court order?
- I can try to get a court order,
but confidentiality around reproductive rights
is pretty tight.
- All right, well, in the meantime,
we go back to Zoe.
- And ask her what?
- Maybe she knows somebody who wanted to get her pregnant.
- So the semen on the rape kit matched to Cooper,
but it wasn't him?
- It looks like he has an alibi.
So Zoe, I, uh, have to ask you a sort of delicate question.
- It can't be any worse than anything else
I've answered here.
- You said that Klaus penetrated you,
and I wanted to know if you could
describe that a little more.
What did it feel like?
- To be with a man after two years,
it was fun,
till it wasn't.
I felt his penis go inside of me.
But like I said, it was pretty micro,
and now I'm just confused.
It all happened very fast.
- Right.
- The nurse gave me a morning after pill.
I hadn't thought about taking it, but--
- Well, that's your decision.
[pensive music]
- Klaus was always so respectful of my boundaries.
He was a gentle dom.
I thought we were having so much fun.
Why would Klaus do something like that?
- I don't know.
But what I do know is that
some guys have a pregnancy fetish.
It's the ultimate exertion of power.
[phone chimes]
- Oh, my God. - What?
- It's--it's him. It's Klaus.
- What did he say?
- "I never meant to hurt you.
"I'm going out of the country,
and I wanna see you one last time."
What--what should I do?
[phone chimes]
"My little A student, shut the lights
then stand by the window."
The instructions are almost exactly the same.
- All right, Zoe.
You just get him in the room, okay?
- We'll do the rest.
- They say light's the best sanitizer.
- Infrared's even better.
- Don't need either to get an admission on tape.
- All right, guys, be ready to move in quickly.
[tense music]
♪
Let's move.
Jenna?
- I thought--how could you?
- Zoe, I just wanna see you be happy.
- Oh, my God. - I thought you were my friend.
- I'm still your friend. I'm still your friend.
- No, you're not.
I don't even know who you are. - You know my heart.
Please, just let me explain. - Let's go.
- Please, I can't let you-- please let me--
- You'll explain at the precinct.
Let's go. - It's okay.
You okay? It's okay. - [gasping]
It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.
Shh. It's okay.
.
- You didn't have to bring me home, Captain Benson.
I'm all right.
- Zoe, you might think that you are,
but you've just been through a pretty big shock.
- I feel so stupid.
I didn't know it was her. You have to believe me.
- Well, it's called willful blindness.
And believe me, I've had my share.
- What the hell was she thinking?
- You know, my detectives are talking to Jenna now,
and all I know is that, um,
Jenna had downloaded the IdealDate app on her phone.
And she saved Klaus's DMs to you.
[apprehensive music]
- The sick thing is, I was happy.
- Well, that's the power of fantasy.
But it's looking more and more like your friend
had a fantasy of power.
- Over me.
- And her own life.
Look, there's a lot to unpack there, but, um,
is there anything I can do for you?
Can I call someone?
Your family or friend or...?
- Two hours ago, I would have told you to call Jenna.
- You know what?
Um, well, from now on, uh,
if you need anything, you call me.
Take care.
♪
- Everything I did, I did for Zoe.
- You wanna tell us about that?
- She was a wreck after Brian died.
I listened to her cry herself to sleep for a full year
through the wall of our guest bedroom.
She needed love.
- And Klaus gave it to her?
Or was it you that wanted the crying to stop?
- Love is messy.
Sometimes it involves a commitment to act
on behalf of a person who can't take care of themselves.
- Yeah, commitment.
Not sexual assault.
- We just wanna hear your side of the story.
How did this all start?
- Have you ever potty trained a child?
- Yeah, it's tough. - Yeah, they cry.
But in the end, you know what's best for them.
Zoe was ready to get back out there.
But she was so heartbroken
when she wasn't getting any matches.
- So you stepped in?
- Yeah, a handsome, smart man wanted her.
The longer it went on, the harder it was to get out.
I was trying to help her mourn her dead husband,
not put her in a position to feel lost again.
- I get that.
But trying to get her pregnant?
- Yeah, Zoe always wanted a family.
We dreamt of raising our children together.
- But it all came crashing to a halt?
- The night Brian had his aneurysm.
- So when did you decide to become the sperm fairy?
- I remember when Cooper told Zoe
how he made money in college.
She and I laughed about it over lunch.
- And in the wake of Brian's death,
similarities just couldn't be ignored.
- Zoe we would never be able to meet another Brian.
But maybe she could make one.
I just wanted to see her back on track.
♪
- So Jenna's still not denying any of this?
- She thinks it's what Zoe wanted.
- Classic she said, she said, huh?
- So what can you charge her with?
- Not rape. She used her finger.
- That's right, officer, it's not rape.
But Zoe didn't consent to penetration.
- So sexual assault with an object,
aggravated sexual abuse, a felony?
- Impressive. You know your law.
- What about their prior sexual encounters?
Even if it was consensual, Zoe consented
to having sex with Klaus.
- I don't know, we've been down that road before.
There's no rape-by-fraud law in New York.
Could fall under sexual abuse three.
- Inability to consent due to incapacitation?
Including deceit.
- So now that we've figured that out,
we'll need Zoe on board if I'm gonna leverage a plea deal.
- No trial? - Not if I can avoid it.
We have enough trouble making sense of this.
I can't imagine what a jury is gonna think.
- I'll talk to Zoe.
- Jenna Scott.
On eight counts of sexual abuse in the third degree
and one count of aggravated sexual abuse
in the first degree, how do you plead?
- Not guilty, Your Honor.
- People on bail?
- We request 100,000.
The circumstances of this case are unusual,
but these are serious charges.
- Which my client intends to defend herself against.
She's not a flight risk. She's married with a child.
- I'm granting ROR.
Better luck next time, Counselor.
Bailiff, next case.
- Well, round one to you, Ms. Efron.
- Oh, I'm just getting started.
- Well, I'm ready to talk deal whenever you are.
- Why would we do that?
No jury is gonna believe your vic
had no idea who my client was.
- Sex assault is sex assault, Ms. Efron.
- Which this was not.
See you in court.
- That's defense attorney's confident.
- Mm. And she's not wrong.
- Jenna's husband sticking with her.
She must spin a good story.
- Yeah, well, one I've learned is,
you never know what's going on in someone's marriage.
- Even his own?
- Jenna wouldn't take the deal?
- Well, she's listening to her attorney.
- Does she even think she did anything wrong?
- Define wrong.
- I wanna talk to her. - Hold on. Zoe.
Zoe, listen to me.
I strongly, strongly advise against that.
- I want her to admit that she hurt me, that she lied to me.
- She doesn't see it like that.
She thinks that she was making you happy.
- She always was the one trying to be in control.
- I know, and right now,
we can go back to Carisi and try to get a deal.
Telling your side of the story in court
can give you a sense of having your power back.
But being cross-examined when you're angry
can also complicate things,
and I just--I want you to be prepared for that.
- Trust me, going on the stand when you're pissed
is not a good idea.
- But if I don't, Jenna just gets away with it.
She wins like she always does.
- And you have every right to be angry.
- I spent the last two years of my life
feeling sorry for myself.
And anger feels pretty good right now.
I lost my husband.
I can survive losing my best friend.
[tense music]
But I will not lose this trial.
- Okay.
.
- I met Klaus online.
Started DMing, but he didn't wanna meet
in person, not at first.
I'd never really pursued a guy before,
so I pushed until he agreed to meet me at a hotel.
- Where you had a sexual relationship?
- More like sensual.
Klaus gave specific orders.
I was to be blindfolded.
It was all very dominant.
I enjoyed that.
- Enjoyed with Klaus, who you believed was a man.
Can you tell the jury how that was possible?
- Any time Jenna spoke, she disguised her voice
in a horse whisper, only touched me with hands.
I wasn't allowed to touch his body.
I was promised that as a reward,
but I never was allowed.
- Why was that?
- He said I had to earn that privilege.
It was just part of our game.
- Just to be clear, those games you consented to
over the course of a month?
- Yes.
But I now know I was being deceived the entire time.
Jenna was lying to control me, once again.
- Objection-- this witness has no knowledge
of the defendant's intent.
- Sustained.
The jury will disregard.
- Mrs. Green, what happened the night of your assault?
- It all started the same, except this time,
I was penetrated by what I thought was a penis.
- And how did you respond?
- I said no.
I used our safe word.
- And then what happened?
- Then he ejaculated.
I only learned later that it was Jenna's finger.
Well, obviously, Jenna doesn't have a penis.
But she was trying to impregnate me.
- And did you consent to any of that?
- No.
- And when did you first learn
that Klaus was, in fact, Jenna?
- After I reported the assault, Jenna DM'd me as Klaus.
The police made me promise to tell no one
so they could set up a controlled meet at the hotel.
She was masked, I was mic'd.
- Why did she wanna meet?
- She was aware she had done something to hurt me.
But more than that, Jenna talks a lot
about how boring her life is.
She has an addictive personality
mixed with a high need for novelty.
It's possible she liked being Klaus better than herself.
- Thank you. Nothing further.
[suspenseful music]
- Mrs. Green, isn't it true
that Mrs. Scott is your best friend?
- She was.
- All the same, you go way back to freshman year in college?
- Yes.
- You were roommates all four years,
then lived together after college
until Mrs. Scott met her husband and you met yours.
That's a lot of history, fair to say, 14 years?
- Roughly. - Yeah.
In that time, you've hugged-- what--hundreds of times?
You've even slept in the same bed more than a few times.
- On vacation or once at a destination wedding,
and when my husband died.
- You've been in the same bed?
So you know what her body feels like, smells like.
And yet you expect a jury to believe
you had no idea it was her,
even in the dark with a blindfold on?
- This was different.
This was sexual.
- So it's your testimony you never had sex
with my client before.
- Objection. Where is this going?
- I apologize, Your Honor,
but new evidence has just come to light.
- What new evidence?
- I just found out my client and Mrs. Green
had several sexual encounters while back in college.
- Objection.
- Overruled.
Witness may answer.
- Well, I wouldn't describe it as sexual.
We were kids, drunk, experimenting.
- I'll remind you, you're under oath.
Were you naked together?
- Well, yes, but--
- Did you orgasm during those encounters?
Do you remember having any orgasms in the hotel
over the past month?
- I don't remember.
- That's interesting,
because you told my client over lunch that you did.
- Objection. Hearsay.
- Defense, exhibit A.
Can you please read these for the jury?
Are those your texts, Mrs. Green?
- Yes, but--
- Please read them for the jury.
♪
- "Klaus is hot.
"The edging is delicious.
"He gave me my first real orgasm in years.
"I hate to say it, but even better than Brian.
- Fair to say, given these texts,
that you continued to seek out Klaus, pushed to meet,
even after my client tried to break things off
and talk you out of ever meeting Klaus.
- It's sad to say, but yes.
- Nothing further.
- Redirect, Your Honor.
Mrs. Green, though you may have consented
to Jenna in the past, did you consent
to her the night in question?
- No. No, I didn't.
♪
- You had sex with Jenna in college
and you didn't tell me? - It was so long ago.
What does that have to do with what happened?
- Do you realize what the jury just heard?
That you had an ongoing sexual relationship with her.
- Yeah, in the past. Not now.
- This time she consented, not to Jenna, but to Klaus.
- A moral distinction.
It doesn't matter in the absence of credibility.
- Jenna still assaulted me.
- I know, Zoe.
But the jury sees you as a liar now.
- Well, I didn't lie.
- And the problem is, all of your testimony
has been called into question.
- I never told anyone that Jenna and I
used to experiment together.
I'm sure Richard didn't even know until just now.
I need some air.
- I'll walk her out. - Yeah. Do that.
- Hey, go easy on her.
I mean, in the last two years,
she's lost three people, right, her husband,
Klaus, and her best friend.
- Yeah, well I'm gonna lose this case.
Because if Efron files a motion to dismiss,
I don't know how I'm gonna object.
- Sexual assault is sexual assault.
It doesn't matter if she consented to the shared fantasy
or didn't divulge her deepest, darkest secret to you.
- This was a tough enough case to begin with, Liv.
It was a whisper in the dark.
- What?
- Now it's the full-throated braggadocio
of Efron laughing at us.
- She wants a dismissal? - Oh, no. Worse.
She's putting her client on the stand.
♪
.
- I've always been there for Zoe.
The night Brian died, I held her
as she wailed for nine hours straight.
It was scary.
If you've never heard true loss like that, it's primal.
I thought she tried to kill herself.
I wanted to fix her.
- Is that when you first invented this Klaus character?
- No.
But it turned out to be exactly what Zoe needed.
And I love her so much I was willing to do anything.
- Even if it meant being someone else?
- That was part of the fun.
Back in college, we'd fantasize about the careers
we'd have one day, the men we might marry,
what we'd name a child if we had one.
It was our dynamic.
I assumed Zoe knew I was Klaus.
- Why would you assume that?
- She'd recount her nights with him,
allow me to read her texts.
It was all fantasy, a continuation
of the games we started in college,
sexual and otherwise.
- And the night Zoe claims you assaulted her,
was that all part of the game?
- She clearly wanted to be overpowered.
Zoe has always taken on a submissive role
in our relationship.
- And you asked her to choose a safe word?
What was it?
- Athena,
after Athena Hall, our old dorm.
- Mm, and what did you take that to mean
that she picked that safe word out of any other phrase
she could have chosen?
- That she knew it was all a game of fantasy.
- And the night in question, did she use the word?
- If she did, I didn't hear it over her moans of pleasure.
- When you penetrated her, were her legs open?
- Yes.
- Were they positioned that way involuntarily,
with ropes, or some other kind of bondage play at the time?
- No.
- Ms. Scott, we've heard you talk a lot about fantasy.
But can you tell me, was it her fantasy
to be forcibly impregnated by her nephew's sperm?
- She always talked about how similar
Brian and Cooper looked.
- Okay.
Let me ask you, how much of this
was about ultimate control?
Subjugation versus fantasy?
The two of you could have just gone down
to the cryo bank together, could you not?
I mean, why--why did you do any of this as Klaus?
- Like I said, Zoe knew it was me.
- Right, even though she couldn't see your face,
she was blindfolded, and it was dark?
- Yes.
- Okay, Your Honor, with your permission,
I would like to put that to the test.
- Objection. - What?
You like springing things on me.
A little latitude, Your Honor, please.
- Just a little, Mr. Carisi.
- Hit it, bailiff.
- Mr. Carisi.
- One question, Your Honor.
Ms. Scott, what color is my tie?
- Uh...
I don't know. I can't see it.
- Are you sure?
I'm standing right here.
- Thought you said one question?
- Excuse me.
Would you--would you come with me, please?
Come on. Just take your time.
Follow my voice. Right this way.
All right, who is this person standing before you right now?
- Uh, Zoe?
- Okay, Your Honor, I object to this whole performance.
- Mr. Carisi, my patience for your antics is at an end.
Bailiff.
[tense music]
- Richard?
- You slept with Zoe in college?
You cheated on me, and you didn't tell me.
- You've been married to this man for ten years,
and you could not recognize him in the dark.
How could you possibly expect Zoe to recognize you?
- You asked me how much was fantasy versus control.
Maybe it was neither.
It was selfish.
There wasn't just a hole in Zoe's life.
There was a hole in mine as well.
- Nothing further.
♪
- Madam Foreperson, will you please read the verdict?
- On the charge of aggravated sexual abuse
in the first degree, we find the defendant not guilty.
On the charges of sexual abuse in the third degree,
we find the defendant guilty.
- The state of New York thanks the jury for its service.
Mrs. Scott, you are remanded until sentencing.
♪
- What's gonna happen to her?
Her life, her kid, her husband.
- Well, she was convicted of a misdemeanor.
She'll do less than a year.
- Well, I don't want her to go to jail at all.
- Listen, I can talk to the judge.
And if she agrees to copious amounts of counseling,
I could probably get this down to probation.
But that has gotta be what you really want.
- How are you doing with all this?
- How do you think?
My husband's gone and my best friend too.
- His presence will always be felt.
It's about how you cope.
- Does getting on a dating app count?
- Look, Zoe, you're young.
It's not too late for a fresh start.
- Thank you.
- So what just happened here? Was this justice?
- This is one of those cases where you really
don't know what to think.
- I bet you've seen a lot of those.
- I have. You will too.
You know, this job,
even when you do everything right,
you don't always win.
Get used to that.
♪
[dramatic music]
♪
[wolf howls]